


The Star That Rises in the West

by Fictionista654



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Angst, Dark, Magic Revealed, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-22
Updated: 2020-05-11
Packaged: 2020-07-11 12:55:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 37
Words: 36,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19928410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fictionista654/pseuds/Fictionista654
Summary: Arthur's been missing Merlin for a long time, but he's doing his best to be a good king. Camelot is flourishing, his knights are doing great deeds, and his subjects love him as they never loved his father. And then reports come: a young queen is amassing an army of sorcerers in the west as she prepares to do battle with Camelot. And that's not the worst news.Apparently, the queen has the most powerful sorcerer in the world at her side. His name is Emrys.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I know the word "I" appears in the first paragraph, but it's not really first person. I promise.

Usually a story begins at the start, but I want to show you something.

Picture a muddy battlefield. Thousands and thousands of soldiers clog the ground, clashing their swords or stabbing or being stabbed or dying. Everyone is screaming. The air smells like an open heart. Look at that boy, twisted on the ground, his face smashed in from the horses’ hooves. He wanted to be a knight. He had a lover. His thoughts were just as wide and varied as yours or mine. But that didn’t matter to the war. It trampled him all the same. His name was Gareth, and this is his only part in the story.

But shouldn’t someone witness his death? It’s the least we can do.

I see that you’re uncomfortable now. You’re thinking about it, aren’t you? The wild interior lives of other people, the lives that get cut short by sword or dagger or arrow. Luckily, it will be over soon. There’s a calm forming in the chaos. As if by magic, the soldiers part like the Red Sea (about half these men are devout Christians. They’ll get the reference, don’t worry). 

Look to the left. Do you see that man striding through the channel? Do you see his golden hair, his ice-chip eyes, his proud nose, his sharp stride? Do you see his helm hanging in his hand? His face gleams with sweat. Fighting is serious work. This man is important to the story, but no more important than Gareth. Please remember that.

Now look to the right. Do you see her? She’d be hard to miss. Her hair is literal fire. It licks and hisses down her back. But we’re here for someone else. Look behind her. No, there. Yes, that’s Merlin, wearing her green livery.

It wasn’t supposed to happen like this, but in thirty seconds, Arthur will see Merlin. Merlin will see Arthur. And one of them will kill the other.


	2. A Flesh Wound

Let’s meet Arthur again. I feel as though we didn’t have enough time before, but I want you to introduce you properly. He is asleep, tangled up in his sheets, and drooling. His bed is gigantic, luxurious, draped with silk and velvet, fit for a king. Let him rest. It’s the only time he’s happy. 

Arthur is King Arthur of Camelot. Therefore, you already know his queen is not in bed with him. They have not shared a bed in three years. Arthur misses it. His queen does not. But his queen has somebody to hold through the cold winter nights. Arthur has no one. The only one besides Gwen, the only one he might consider, is dead. At least, he thinks this person is dead, which is pretty much the same thing from his point of view.

Arthur Pendragon is not a selfish man, though he often seems like one. Don’t tell him I said that. But I want you to know him. You have to know him, if this story is going to work. He is not selfish, but he doesn’t share his food. He is not cruel, but he throws goblets at his servants. He is not in love, but he is. He is a mess of contradictions. He often wonders why Merlin ever liked him. Then he thinks about the last thing Merlin said to him, and he has to sit down and stare into space for a little while. 

Guinevere is used to this. Guinevere is the queen. She is on the other side of the castle, warm and safe and curled against Lancelot. He is stroking her hair. Lancelot is kind. He is handsome. Picture a handsome man, and I guarantee you’re close. His eyes are soft. Guinevere’s are hard. She’s been used cruelly in this life. So has Lancelot, but he is naive, or he has a short memory. At the moment, he is the best knight in the Five Kingdoms. He can fell giants with a toothpick sword. He has never lost a joust.

“What are you thinking of?” Lance says to Gwen. She presses her cheek into his chest and shrugs.

“How happy I am, I suppose.” She is not thinking of how happy she is. Lancelot knows this. She knows this. It doesn’t matter. They’ll accept as fact because they have no other choice. How can they admit the castle has become their prison, their chambers their cells? 

She asks Lance to run away with her. He says no. He always says no. 

“Then take me on a quest.”

Lance thinks about this as he runs his fingers through her curly brown hair. “I could,” he says, “if I had a reason to. Do you have any special skills?”

“Healing,” says Gwen. “Sword-fighting. Sewing.”

“That could be useful,” he muses.

“I’m also good at something else,” she adds, and crawls beneath the blanket.

Let’s leave them to it.

There’s one last thing I want you to see. Leave the castle and travel many days and nights until you reach the mountains. There is a castle build into the tallest. The castle has a front, but no back; the back is inside the rock. In this castle, there are a woman and a man. There are many other people as well, but these are the most relevant to our story. The woman has red hair. The man has black hair. They are in love. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

***

“Again,” says Myfanwy. Merlin’s muscles ache and his clothes are drenched with sweat, but he wants to please his queen.

“Which one?” he says.

From her throne, Myfanwy peruses the captives sprawled on the stone floor. “Hmm. That one.”

“No,” Merlin said immediately. “I won’t. Not a child.” The child in question, a begrimed figure in tattered rags, stares blankly at the floor. Its hands are so small.

Myfanwy sighs and crooks one of her long, elegant fingers. “Come here, Merlin.” Reluctantly, Merlin trudges up the steps to the dais. When he is close enough, Myfanwy grabs his chin in her hand.

“You want to do this for me, don’t you?” Her voice is like sugar. Merlin twitches uncertainly.

“I don’t know,” he says quietly. 

“You want to please your queen.”

Merlin’s face smooths out. He can’t remember what he was so upset about. “What shall I do to it, Myfanwy?”

“A quick death,” she says. Merlin nods and turns to face the captives. There are about twenty of them, all too weak to fight back. He thinks they probably would, if they could. They wouldn’t want him to kill a child. But he has a job to do. He reties the silk blindfold and takes a deep breath before casting his consciousness into the room.

The lives pulse like candle-flames. The one behind burns to get close to, and Merlin knows it’s Myfanwy. He would be able to find her even if she knelt among the captives. She knows how to protect herself from people like him, and he wouldn’t want to kill her, anyway. They have already agreed that if she dies, he is to kill himself immediately. He’s too dangerous to wander around without an owner.

He sorts through the pulses, information sparking through each one. This one is a man, and this one a woman, and this one a child, and this one, and this one. He circles around the target, strangely reluctant to kill, even as his queen demands.

“Merlin,” said Myfanwy. “Do you know who that child is? That is Ector de Maris, son of Sir Ban. Do you want to know how many druids Sir Ban killed? And he was not as kind as you.”

Merlin’s thoughts hover around the child’s flame. One pinch, and it would be over. He tries, he tries so hard. Tears fall from his cheeks to the floor, and still, he cannot kill this child. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he says, pulling off the now-damp blindfold and blinking up at Myfanwy. “I can’t do it.”

She looks at him for a long time. “Merlin,” she says at last. “Thank you. You have taught me a valuable lesson. I do believe you’ve restored some of my humanity. Come here, pet.” Merlin kneels by the throne and rests his face in her lap. She strokes his head as though he is someone worth loving.

“I won’t make you do it again,” she whispers into his ear.

And Merlin believes her.

***

It is night in Camelot, and Arthur cannot sleep. He’s painfully aroused, but whenever he tries to take care of it, his thoughts circle back to Merlin. And it seems so crass, so terrible, to pleasure himself to thoughts of a man whose death he caused, however inadvertently. So he lies in silence and suffers, because that is all he knows how to do. 

He knows that if he sleeps, he will dream of Merlin, and he doesn’t want to see Merlin’s intestines again. He doesn’t want to hold them inside Merlin’s body as the intestines wriggled in his hands, writhing like snakes, and he hadn’t known that that was what intestines would be like. Merlin hadn’t either.

“Just a flesh wound,” Merlin had said, his face white with pain. Minutes from death, and he still couldn’t stop joking.

Arthur yanks his mind back. He can’t think of that now. He doesn’t want to think of that now. He turns over in bed and buries his face into a pillow. Tomorrow, he’ll look back on this moment and wonder why he was so upset when things could get so much worse.


	3. Witch in the Woods

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Four things:
> 
> 1\. I changed the rating to mature.  
> 2\. CW for rape and discussions of rape.  
> 3\. As you probably noticed, I changed the title.  
> 4\. This middle part is dark. Like, super dark. If you read the first and last portion, you can totally skip the middle. Search for the "***" that I use to break up scenes.
> 
> Thank you for reading!

There is a witch in the woods. She lives in a hovel and brews potions and sometimes sells love charms that are really bags of oregano. Don’t be deceived by this. She can do magic, true magic, the kind that must come from within. Any charlatan can pick up a few spells, but a witch is something else entirely. The Lady Morgana simply prefers to save her talents for something more meaningful.

She still hasn’t figured out what that might be. She tried her hand at ruling Camelot, but lost heart after her sister died. For a while, she wandered the countryside, performing small miracles to make up for the lives she’d taken in the conquest. But miracles only go so far, and the people she helped never accepted her as one of them. 

So here she is, in her hovel, peering into a Looking Glass. She also has a looking glass, which she doesn’t much use, as evidenced by her greasy matts of hair and dirt-streaked cheeks. This is a Looking Glass; with it, a seer can look into the future. She looks nearly every day. Understandable. The future draws many a curious gaze. 

Let’s look in her Mirror. The glass is clear as ice; it’s the only thing Morgana bothers to clean anymore. (Today, we might call this depression. Morgana calls it _dedicating my energy solely to the practice of magic_.) She strokes the glass’s tarnished bronze back and asks it to tell her the future.

First, there is fire. Morgana was expecting this. There is always fire in the future. Then a woman emerges, unharmed, from the flames. Morgana was _not_ expecting this. She leans so close that her nose almost touches the glass and studies the strange woman. The woman is in chain mail. She has a green surcoat. She has no sword. White skin, red hair, blue eyes. Besides the jagged scar running from her eyebrow to her chin, this woman could be anyone from the west. For all Morgana knows, this woman could be her sister. Their eyes meet through the glass, and Morgana recoils, seconds before the Mirror cracks down the middle.

She needs to go to Camelot.

***

Merlin is lying on silk sheets. Merlin is naked. Merlin is happy. 

“I love you,” he whispers to Myfanwy, and she smiles her crooked smile. 

“Of course you do,” she says, and kisses him. If you’ve been kissed before, you know how confusing it can be. The teeth might remind you of cages. The tongue might remind you of an animal very far down, miles down, that clings to the sea floor.

Merlin is not thinking about cages or sea slugs as he lies beneath Myfanwy. He isn’t thinking much farther than Myfanwy riding him. She is the best lover he has ever had. She always knows what he needs, even if he doesn’t want it at first. Sometimes she rakes her nails down his back until he bleeds. He cried the first time she did it, and she told him it was all right.

We know what’s happening. Obviously, we know what’s happening. It’s an ugly word, isn’t it? It even sounds brutal. Rape. Try it. Feel the way it sounds wrong in your mouth, like something that shouldn’t exist, something from another world that has shunted itself into ours.

We won’t look at these scenes anymore. Not to ignore it, but to give Merlin his privacy. At the very least, we will let him be raped without an audience. 

Here, they’ve finished, now. Merlin is drowsy, pressing his face into a pillow. Myfanwy fondly runs a hand over his back. “I love you,” she tells him, and Merlin smiles drowsily. He says what he has been taught to say after he is raped.

“Thank you, Your Majesty.”

“Oh, Merlin.” She loops a lock of his hair around her finger and tugs. “You are very welcome.”

***

Breathe. You probably need it after what you saw. I’m breathing, too. Five counts in, three counts out. 

Do you want to see something nice?

Morgana has just appeared on the hill that overlooks Camelot. She has not been home for a long time. Strangely, she is happy.


	4. Fire From His Hands

The day before Morgana arrives in Camelot, Arthur and Gwen hold an audience. The line is long, and filled with the usual squabbles over oxen or chickens or land. There have already been many legal systems in this world. For example, there has been the Code of Hammurabi for the Babylonians, the Twelve Tablets for the Romans, the Confucian codes for the Chinese, and the torah for the Jews. 

Arthur’s system is not quite as advanced.

“Um,” he says. “The plow goes to Leo.”

Leo flashes his gums (he has no teeth). “Thank you, shire.” He skips off, followed by his scowling adversary.

“And how did you decide that one?” murmurs Gwen.

“It’s not important,” says Arthur, who had used an ancient version of eeny, meeny, miny, moe. “Next!”

These petitioners are a straggly mess of village-folk. They are ragged, burned, dirt-streaked, and tear-stained. Gwen grips her throne’s arms and leans forward. “What happened?” A village elder who has reached the ancient age of thirty-six steps forward.

“Your Majesties,” says May (for that is her name), and she holds up her rough-spun skirts to curtsey. “We come from the village of Underhill, on the border with Essetir. We consider ourselves citizens of Camelot, and are proud subjects of the Pendragons. We beg you for your help. King Lot’s daughter is sending monsters to our door.”

“What sorts of monsters?” says Gwen. 

The woman falls silent, and the villagers exchange glances. “A man,” one of them says. 

“A sorcerer,” May spits. “He threw fire from his hands and burned our village to the ground, killing seventeen and injuring twenty-six. My daughter’s house collapsed around her.” If you look closely, you’ll see the tears trapped behind May’s glassy eyes. That’s the thing about grief; it’s so easy to transmute into hatred and rage. With a rustle of silk, Gwen steps from her throne and approaches the woman. 

“We will do everything in our power to help you,” she swears, and clutches May’s hands in her own. 

From his throne, Arthur is realizing that this will probably mean a war. He has never met Myfanwy before, and, despite overtures on the part of Camelot, has barely communicated with her at all. Essetir has been weak and unobtrusive since Cenred’s death, and Arthur had thought Myfanwy would follow in her father’s footsteps. There is, of course, the possibility that the villagers are mistaken or lying (we know they aren’t). Once upon a time, Arthur would have ridden out to see for himself, but he has grown sad and tired, and, besides, kings are supposed to delegate. He calls Gwaine over and tells him to take twenty men and ride to the border. 

I’ll introduce Gwaine quickly: tavern, apples, hair, loyalty, hubris. More of the first and less of the last since Merlin’s death.

“Of course, Your Majesty,” says Gwaine, bending at the waist. We’ll get back to him later.

“Is there anything else you can tell us about the sorcerer?” says Gwen, before a guard leads the villagers away. 

“His eyes,” says May. “They were on fire.”

***

Merlin wakes with his dream on the tip of his tongue, but it quickly fades. He is alone in Myfanwy’s chambers, and he knows without trying that the door will be locked. She does this, sometimes. It’s not good for Merlin to be out of her sight, and when Myfanwy must part with him, she locks him in her room. Merlin could easily blast apart the door, but his queen must have a good reason for this. She always does.

Besides, he is naked, and she has not left him clothes. 

He wishes he had a window and didn’t have to depend on magic for light.

He wishes he had a chair to sit in, or a table to eat at, or anything but a bed.

Here’s the thing: it has not occurred to Merlin that these are not Myfanwy’s chambers. There is a wardrobe with her dresses, and a tapestry of her horse, and she comes in the night and leaves in the morning. Why wouldn’t this be hers?

Merlin has never questioned why a queen’s chambers would have, at the focal point of the sloping floor, a drain.

It’s sad to see Merlin pacing like a beaten animal. Some say he is the greatest sorcerer who ever lived, and now he runs his shoulder along the confines of his prison, afraid to open a door. 

He thinks about his dream. You’ll have to give a little time; his mind isn’t what it once was. He thinks there might have been something about a chalice (there was), or maybe a chamber pot (there wasn’t). The last popped into his head because Merlin has to ask for permission each time he wants to use it, and there is no one here to ask. 

Once, Arthur threw a chamber pot at him. He remembers this suddenly, the memory flinging itself into his consciousness. His hands curl into fists, and he tucks them into his armpits so he doesn’t hit the wall like last time. The anger is enough to choke on.

“Don’t you see?” Myfanwy had said years ago, when she first took Merlin to bed. He’d still had the bruise on his forehead, and Myfanwy had asked about it. After he told her, she went silent for a while, just stroking back his sweaty hair.

“Don’t you see how he abused you,” she asked. Merlin didn’t. “He threw things at you.” Every master throws things at their servants. “He worked you half to death.” Every master is demanding. “He mocked you.” He was teasing.

But the seed was already there. Myfanwy watered it, tended to it, praised it as it grew, but ultimately, it wasn’t her who put it there in the first place. Now Merlin cannot think of Arthur without becoming furious. He _hates_ him. Even the name. There is a boy named Arthur who works in the kitchens, and Merlin flinches whenever someone mentions him.

One of the double doors creaks open, and Merlin has never felt anything but joy. He laughs, overwhelmed with happiness. “Your Majesty! You came back for me.”

“Of course I did,” she says amusedly. “I always come back for you.”

I promised we’d look away.

Let’s return to Morgana.

***

Morgana has aged sixty years in one night. Literally. Nearly everyone in the citadel would recognize Morgana Pendragon, and most who know her are terrified of her face, so she must use magic to disguise herself. 

Maude, however, is a stranger. She is a stooped old woman with sloughing flesh and cloudy eyes and stale breath. The cataracts are frustrating, yes, but never let it be said that Morgana doesn’t suffer for her cause. And what is her cause? Why has she come to a land that has a price on her head? 

Quite simply, Morgana needs an army. Arthur has one. And for once, their goals are aligned.

And then there is Guinevere, but that is a different matter entirely.


	5. Quiet Kisses

Once upon a time, there are two girls in a large bed. The windows are open, and the fresh spring night fills the room. 

“Do they hurt?” says the first girl. The second girl looks down at her chest.

“Only when I bump into something,” she says. 

The first girl is impressed. “I wish mine would start growing.”

“No, it’s really a bother,” says the second girl. “You’re lucky.” 

Once upon a time, five years later, the girls are in the same bed. It is winter this time, and the windows are shut tightly against the cold. The fire crackles in the hearth and fills the room with warmth and golden light. 

“You did _what_?” says the first girl. 

“Shh,” says the second, glancing around, before she remembers that Nurse has just stopped sleeping in her chambers. “We were in the rose garden, and it was so hot out, and Lord Ashton’s son is so pretty. He has those big brown eyes. Now that I think about it, his look sort of like yours.”

The first girl giggles into her pillow. “Stop!” 

“No, I’m serious.” The second girl slings her arms around the first girl and holds tight. “You’ve got beautiful eyes, Guinevere.”

“Thank you, Morgana,” she says. “And then what happened?”

“Oh,” says Morgana carelessly. “Then he kissed me and put his tongue in my mouth.”

“He didn’t!”

“He did!” yells Morgana, and they both bounce on their knees, laughing. 

Once upon a time, Morgana and Gwen are nineteen, and it’s the start of autumn, and the window is open, and Morgana asks Gwen if she ever sometimes wants to kiss someone she shouldn’t.

“I don’t know,” says Gwen. “Who are you thinking of?”

And so that is how it starts for real. The friendly touches become more charged each day, until it is hard for them to fall asleep, close as they are in the same bed. They already know almost everything there is to know about each other; this is the last frontier. In quiet kisses shared in the dark, in soft licks of tongues and presses of fingers, each offers herself to the other. They have been told all their lives not to touch there, and now they crave it. They tell each other what feels good, and what could use some work, and what should never be tried again. 

Gwen likes to use her fingers on Morgana. She says she loves to see Morgana’s face while she is inside her, she loves to press her thumb to that place and watch Morgana’s lashes flutter. Morgana prefers to use her mouth. She likes to hold Gwen’s hips down and suck at her as Gwen strains against her hands. It seems that they will be this forever.

So it is a shock when Morgana dreams of Lancelot.

Do you understand, now, a little more about Morgana? She was young when she declared war on Camelot. She was ruthless and powerful, yes, but she was also a heartbroken little girl. She still is a heartbroken girl. It does not excuse the deaths under her reign, but there has been just as much death under Arthur’s. 

He just has better PR.

(Do you remember the seed in Merlin’s heart?)

On the day after Morgana’s arrival, we find her inside the castle. It’s ridiculous, really, who they’ll let in, and she easily hobbles past the guards into her old home. She stares at everything. Here are the stairs she and Arthur would sled down, and there is the corner where she kissed Gwen after the winter ball, and those are the stones she used to judge her height against.

Morgana cannot wander for as long as she wants; the spell is already beginning to fray. She limps up the staircase to the second floor, where the marble glows white in the sunlight. Everything is as she remembers, so why does she feel so uneasy? Yes, it’s freezing, but the castle always froze in winter. She tells herself she just needs to find a fire.

No, it’s something else. She’s almost at her old chambers when she realizes.

The wards. There used to be layers and layers of protective magic wound about the castle, though she never learned who’d cast them. They’d been a boon when she was queen, as they protected anyone of Pendragon blood. Now she catches cobwebs of it here and there, but nothing real. Whoever tended to them is long gone.

Two knights turn the corner, barely sparing Morgana a look as they pass. She recognizes them as the attackers who took away her throne. She feels spark of antipathy, but it’s hard to keep it alive.

“What did Arthur say,” asks the bulky one—Percival. Sir Percival.

“Just to leave as soon as we can,” says the other, and of course Morgana remembers _him_. Gwaine took out every man she threw at him. 

“He’s not…?”

Gwaine snorts. “Of course he isn’t coming with us. He’s too busy sitting on his throne and doing nothing.”

“Do you think he’ll get better soon?” Percy says hopefully.

“All I know is it’s a good thing Merlin isn’t here to see him like this.” Gwaine pauses to reflect. “Though if Merlin were here, Arthur wouldn’t be like this at all.” He slaps Percy’s back. “All right, it’s time ride out.”

Maybe it makes Morgana a terrible person, but it’s good to know that Arthur is suffering, too. 

***

“ _This_ is Emrys?” says Sir Agravaine, his tiny eyes glittering. 

Myfanwy cuts into her steak and lifts a particularly bloody piece to her mouth. Merlin, seated on a small stool next to her, patiently waits for scraps. “Yes,” says Myfanwy. “And he’s all mine. Right, Merlin?” Merlin nods enthusiastically.

“Go on, then,” says Agravaine. “Show me.”

“Very well,” says Myfanwy and wipes her mouth with her napkin. “Up, Merlin.” He stands nervously.

“Your Majesty?”

“Do some magic for us.”

Merlin considers as he unspools the magic in his blood. He hasn’t been allowed to let it out since the fire, and the relief exhilarates him. His fingers twitch, and all the candles in the Great Hall flicker. A wind stirs.

“He was nothing when I rescued him,” said Myfanwy. “He’d been hiding his powers for so long that they had atrophied. Imagine that! The greatest sorcerer in the world, brought to heel by Arthur Pendragon.”

The name rips something loose in Merlin, and he yanks at the oxygen in the air around Agravaine. The man chokes, one hand clawing at his throat as if there’s something around it. It’s stupid of him—all he has to do is move to a different chair. But panicked men don’t think well, and Merlin is about to let him up when Myfanwy holds out her hand.

“No, Merlin. Give him five more seconds.”

Merlin shifts uncomfortably but does as she asks, gratefully dropping the spell when the time is up. A very purple Agravaine splutters and gulps his wine and chokes on his wine and splutters and gulps more wine and splutters some more.

“That thing is deadly,” he says when he can talk. Myfanwy’s flat red mouth curls in distaste.

“Merlin is not an _it_ , Agravaine. He is the most powerful person in this room, and you will treat him as such.” Merlin smiles at his shoes. Myfanwy is so kind to him.

Agravaine coughs into his fist. “Um,” he says. “Er. I apologize, Merlin.” Merlin looks at Myfanwy, who nods.

“Thank you, Lord Agravaine.” 

Myfanwy fondly rubs her thumb over Merlin’s hand. “You are remarkable,” she tells him. “In fact, I think you’ve earned yourself a seat at the table.”

Merlin automatically takes a step back. The last time he sat at the table, Myfanwy had had to remind him that only people who deserved seats got them. He wonders if this is a test. But Myfanwy nods to a servant, who pulls back one of the chairs. Another sets down a plate. It’s odd to sit as Myfanwy’s equal, especially when Merlin keeps waiting for someone to drag him to the whipping post.

Myfanwy leans over so her mouth is at Merlin’s ear. She smells like rosewater. “I love you, I love you, I love you.” She rests her hand on Merlin’s head, and he eats slowly, aware with each bite of the pressure bearing down above him.


	6. The Happiest Woman

Arthur Pendragon is remembering.

In his memory, it is one of the hottest days of summer. Arthur is leaning over a bluff, crossbow at the ready as he waits for a worthy animal to cross into his line of sight. It is so humid that he feels like he’s drowning with every breath. The grass prickles his stomach.

“Arthur,” whines Merlin, like leaning against a tree while Arthur does all the work is a such a challenge. “Can’t we go back now? It’s been hours.”

Arthur breathes through his clenched jaw. “Merlin, some of us are trying to concentrate.”

“You,” says Merlin. “You’re trying to concentrate. I’m having a great time not concentrating.” Arthur shakes the drowsiness out of his head and realigns his crossbow. “Arthur, my balls are sweating.” 

“MERLIN!” yells Arthur, sitting up. “I DON’T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT YOUR BALLS.”

Merlin grins and goes back to picking apart a leaf. Arthur watches him for a moment to make sure he doesn’t try anything before turning back over the ravine. He’s aware of Merlin’s presence creeping closer and closer until Merlin’s practically lying next to him.

“Not much happening,” Merlin says conversationally. “D’you think all the animals are asleep? ‘Cause I could use a nap—”

“Merlin.”

“Right.”

And then Merlin starts to breathe. Not that he wasn’t breathing before, but Arthur can hear it now. It’s loud and annoying and he wants to press his hand over Merlin’s mouth. Then he remembers he’s the king and can do whatever the hell he wants.

“Mmf!” says Merlin, staring at Arthur over the hand. “Mmm-mmm-mmmf!!!”

“That’s better,” Arthur says smugly. Then something wet and squishy swipes across his palm. He snatches back his hand. “You licked me!”

“You gagged me!” says Merlin. And, Christ, Merlin really _is_ sweating. His entire face is glistening and his hair is wet and there’s a damp patch on his chest and he smells like a barnyard, and his soft, full lips are parting again in preparation for more useless babble, and before he can think it through, Arthur lunges forward and presses his mouth—

Now, in the present, Arthur jolts in his chair with the memory of the kiss. His elbow knocks the inkwell, which tips over onto a crops report. “Fuck!” The ink spreads rapidly, and Arthur just gazes it, transfixed. It swallows up word after word, like it’s starving. 

That was how Merlin kissed, by the way. Like he was starving.

“Arthur,” he’d said, his eyes wide. He was laughing and smiling and crying, and Arthur was too, and they didn’t know. How could they?

Merlin’s death was just hours away.

Arthur holds back a wail. He’s the king, not a babe in swaddling cloths. But sometimes it really feels like he is one. His needs are simple: eat, sleep, mourn. Rule the kingdom in between. He twists his signet ring around and around his little finger, watching the crest pop into and out of view. It’s going to be one of those nights, he can already tell.

In and out. In and out. In and out. 

Merlin used to play with this ring, even before they kissed. During random conversations, he’d bring his hand to Arthur’s and twist the ring around. They both knew that it was inappropriate. Merlin was pushing boundaries. Arthur never stopped him. 

It’s getting too dark to write, and Arthur stretches his arms before calling out for his manservant. “George!”

George trots out of his chambers, which are just a little room off Arthur’s. “Yes, Your Majesty?”

“Tell the queen that I will not be joining her for supper.” 

“Yes, Your Majesty.” George scurries out. Arthur waits until he’s sure George isn’t coming back for anything before he kneels before the chest at the foot of his bed and unlocks it. It smells good, like pine wood, and and Arthur breathes deeply before sorting through the contents.

His mother’s ring. A toy sword. A blue tunic. He picks it up, digging his fingers into the worn fabric. He’s almost afraid, but when he brings it to his nose, it still smells of him. Of his crude soap—which did make him smell disturbingly like Gaius—and his mint leaves and his _boy_ smell, the one that Gwen used to wrinkle her nose at when Arthur came to bed without a bath. 

Arthur sits back on his heels and breathes and breathes and breathes. 

***

Gwen’s pillowslip is missing. Not all of them, just the one from her favorite pillow. Biting back a sigh of annoyance, Gwen divests one of the lumpier pillows of its slip and puts it on the good one. She’ll have to have a talk with Sifa about attention to detail. 

It’s stuffy in here, and Gwen opens the window and leans out. The sun is giving its last gasps as it sinks into the woods, and the courtyard is glowing with the afternoon light. Why is dusk so beautiful when it’s such a melancholy time of day? When Gwen was little, she’d scream when the sun went down. It gave her such a panicky feeling, like time was running out.

She likes dusk better now. Night is the only time she can shrug off the mantle of queen and go back to being plain old Gwen. Not that she doesn’t like being queen—in fact, she’s surprisingly suited for it. But she thinks there will always be a part of her that feels like it’s playing a part.

There’s a knock at the door, and Gwen collects herself, straightening out her skirts and smoothing her crown of braids.

“Enter!” she calls, settling herself at her desk. It’s George. How irritating. But Gwen is a kind person at heart, and she smiles warmly. 

“Your Majesty,” says George, bowing so deeply it’s surprising he doesn’t fall over. Now _that_ would be amusing. “The king wished me to inform you that he will be dining alone tonight.”

Gwen stiffens. There’s war approaching, which means taxes to raise and soldiers to gather and all sorts of things to work out. And instead of working through it with the Round Table, with Gwen, Arthur’s taking yet another opportunity to…to…

No. She won’t have it. “Thank you, George,” she says, and waits for him to leave before ringing for Sifa. 

“Have my meal sent to the king’s chambers,” she says. Sifa looks startled, but nods and hurries off. Gwen leaves after her, striding down the corridor to Arthur’s rooms. The guards outside his door incline their heads, and she breezes past them.

“Arthur,” she says.

Arthur raises his head from where it’s fallen to his desk and frowns. “I thought I told George—”

“You did,” says Gwen, and drags a seat from the table so she can sit facing Arthur. “But we need to talk.” Arthur sighs and gestures for her to begin. Ghosts of wrinkles fan above his brows; his eyes are shadowed. For the first time—maybe because of the dim lighting—she can see what Arthur will look like as an old man.

Gwen swallows hard and raises her head. She takes no joy in her task. “When you asked me to marry you, I was the happiest woman alive.” Arthur opens his mouth, but she shakes her head. “No, let me finish. I was the happiest woman alive, and Merlin—”

Arthur makes a strangled, betrayed noise. Gwen raises her hand. “I was the happiest woman, and Merlin was the unhappiest man.” 

“ _Gwen_ ,” says Arthur, and she can’t stand the pain in his eyes.

“He loved you.”

“So?”

“He loved you, and he lost you, and he still stripped your bed and washed your back and fetched your breakfast. He still _did his fucking job_!” says Gwen, slapping the desktop. “So why can’t you?”

A muscle jumps in Arthur’s jaw, and he must breathe before he can speak. “I don’t know what you think I’m doing Guinevere, but it isn’t nothing. Galahad got that Grail thing, and Gwaine defeated the Green Knight, and I’ve just received news from Kay and Bedivere that they’ve killed a giant.” 

Though she no longer loves him as she once did, Gwen does not like to hurt her husband. But she is getting impatient. “The Round Table isn’t meant for you to hide behind. You need to get over him. Merlin. Is. Dead.”

It would be hard to describe Arthur’s emotions. Perhaps it is easiest to say that he is in despair. He wants to press his head into Merlin’s neck, he wants to hug Merlin until his heart explodes, he wants to suck on Merlin’s ears and kiss his cheeks and eat him up so he can never go away again. But that’s impossible. 

“Gwen,” he says, his voice tense enough to snap. “Please leave me.”

Her eyes flick over his face, and he stares boldly back. His face is flushed the way it is when he’s trying not to cry. She won’t make him break down in front of her.

“I don’t ask much,” she says as she rises. “Just that you don’t allow this guilt to kill you. Goodnight, Arthur.” 

Arthur waits until the door is almost shut behind him before he says, “Goodnight, Guinevere.”

Ten minutes later, Sifa arrives with Gwen's supper.


	7. Lovely Little Monster

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW for Myfanwy sexually assaulting Merlin.

Many people collect things. Lots of children collect sports cards, which they trade for things. You might collect shot glasses or snow-globes or stamps. I myself collect keychains. Myfanwy, of course, cannot collect any of these things because they have not yet been invented.

So she collects sorcerers instead.

All sorts of sorcerers. Young sorcerers, old sorcerers, female sorcerers, male sorcerers, sorcerers that prefer to be called witches, and sorcerers that prefer to be called enchanters. Most of them come from her own kingdom, but some are refugees of the Great Purge. Still others are kingdomless mercenaries who sell their powers to the highest bidder. In this case, that would be Myfanwy.

She keeps her sorcerers in a grand estate, where they have the freedom to hone their abilities. The most talented, she culls for her army. This, she knows, will be her greatest edge against Camelot. Both her infantry and mounted knights are less in number than Camelot’s, but she has magic on her side. 

And then there’s Merlin. If she had to pick between him and all the other sorcerers in her grasp, she would be an idiot to lose him. He’s worth hundred, thousands, _millions_ of them. She tells him this all the time.

“I need you to do something for me,” she says, wrapping her fingers around his penis. Merlin, his trousers around his ankles, blinks sleepily at her. He’s leaning against a large oak tree, no shirt, his face tipped toward the moonlight. Beautiful. 

“Anything, Your Majesty.” 

She puts a thumb to his soft lips and presses down. His lips part easily, and his mouth is hot around her. “You’re going to go down into that village,” she murmurs, “and you are going to give them a message from me.”

Merlin can’t speak around her fingers, but he nods. Myfanwy gives him a few more strokes before pulling up his trousers. Merlin whimpers, but he’ll just have to get over it. “Go on,” she says. He stumbles on his colt legs away from her, casting one last look over his shoulder at the edge of the trees. Her ruby pendant pulses beneath her gown, and she presses her hand to the lump between her breasts. The rock warms, comforting her, and Merlin disappears between the trees.

A low voice comes from the darkness. “You have him wrapped around your cunt, Myfanwy.”

“I don’t know if it works like that,” she says mildly. 

“Doesn't it?” says Vortigern, his dark cloak sweeping over the grass as he comes to stand next to her. In the weak moonlight, it is possible to see a hint of a broad, white face beneath his hood, and the glint of his eyes.

Myfanwy sighs and wraps her arms around herself. It is bitterly cold, and she is not in the mood for Vortigern’s games. “Do you have the Saxons you promised?”

“Have I ever failed you?”

“That’s not an answer.”

Vortigern chuckles. “I have them, little queen.”

Oh, how he aggravates her. “When will they be ready to march?” 

“Soon,” says Vortigern. “Sooner if I get my coin.”

“When we take Camelot, you’ll have all the riches you could ever want,” Myfanwy promises. “Merlin’s told me of the stores beneath the castle. Rooms and rooms of gold and precious gems, and all sorts of magical artifacts that have been left to languish under the Pendragon rule.” 

“What use have I for magic?” says Vortigern, and his voice raises the hairs on Myfanwy’s neck. How she would love to kill him! It wouldn’t take much, just a slip of a dagger or a tilt of her mind. She could have him throw himself off a cliff. But she needs his Saxons, and he knows it. She comforts herself with the idea that when the war is over she’ll make up some charge or another and have him executed. 

Merlin is using his magic now. She can feel the ghost of his abilities tingling in her own hands. “You may have no use for magic,” she says, “but that is because you are a fool. Only cowards turn their backs on true power.”

“I’ll leave you to your spells, then,” says Vortigern. “But I am secure knowing that I rely on nothing but myself.” 

_And the small fortune I’ve promised you,_ Myfanwy thinks darkly. A scream illuminates the night, and she and Vortigern both still.

“That would be yours?” says Vortigern, and Myfanwy smiles.

“Merlin is my lovely little monster,” she says. “He knows how to terrify.” Sparks fly above the trees, and Myfanwy begs her leave. “The conquest is over. It’s time to meet the spoils. Next time I see you—”

“I’ll have the Saxons,” Vortigern finishes. “Goodnight, Your Majesty.”

“Goodnight Vortigern,” says Myfanwy, and follows Merlin’s path into the trees.

***

The pillowslip smells like that strange eastern fruit—coconut, Morgana thinks. Some women with Gwen’s hair use its oil when they wash, but Gwen had always been too poor to afford it. Even through the coconut, Morgana can still smell the Gwen she knew in its threads. Maybe it’s the wildflowers Gwen would crush into her skin. The coal dust, the iron, those scents are gone. Gwen isn’t a smith’s daughter anymore. 

Uther Pendragon made sure of that.

A raucous laugh comes from the tavern downstairs, and Morgana remembers the night she and Gwen snuck into the Rising Sun. They couldn’t have been more than fourteen, and they’d both been shaking with excitement. Morgana had worn Gwen’s skirts and covered her hair with a rag, but she wasn’t sure anyone had bought the disguise. Still, they’d had a marvelous time. Gwen got drunk and had to cling to Morgana’s shoulder all the way back to the castle.

Sitting on her bed, Morgana gazes through the window. It’s almost midnight, and the full moon rises like a fist in the sky.“Mother, giver of life,” Morgana murmurs, fingers rubbing the silk in her hands. “You who are the full belly, the rounded moon, the life-giver. Hear the prayers of your daughter.” Her voice catches, though she doesn’t know why. “I—I need your guidance, Mother.” The ghostly moonlight plays along Morgana’s walls, and she shudders. “What do I do about Gwen?”

The answer, when it comes, is not from the Triple Goddess. It is from Morgana’s heart, but she thanks the Mother all the same. Tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow she will see her love again.


	8. Baby Teeth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW for some gore.

Let’s check in on Gwaine, shall we? Right now he is very, very cold, and very, very wet. The freezing rain drips on his skull and worms down his doublet, and his horse keeps getting spooked by absolutely nothing. But that’s not why he’s upset right now. He’s used to trouble on the road; it comes with the territory of being a traveling drunk. 

No, he’s upset because they’ve just found their third village. 

“I hate this,” says Bohrs, inching away. 

“That’s funny, because the rest of us our having the time of our lives,” says Dagonet. “Oh fuck, that one came out of nowhere.”

“He’s been there the whole bloody time.”

“As if you didn’t jump out of your mind in that cabin back there.”

“Enough,” says Percival. Gwaine wipes his brow with the back of his gauntlet and looks around the village yet again. It’s different from the others. The first was a seeping cesspit, and the second had still been smoking when they arrived. This time, the monster—for that’s what Gwaine and Percy have taken to calling him—left everything pristine. The houses stand, the grass grows. It’s the people who are the problem.

(I know _you_ know who the monster is, but Gwaine is still working within the realm of probabilities.) 

“Do you think there’s any meaning behind the material?” says Bohrs, delicately running a finger over a woman’s shoulder. She was drawing water when the monster attacked, and her off-white fingers still curl tight around the rope. “What is this, anyway?”

“It comes from, what are they called,” says Ector. His nose is dripping as usual, and he’s deliberating about the ethics of stealing cloth from a statue. “From those animal things they’ve got in that place.” Percival scratches his head. 

“It’s ivory,” Gwaine says heavily. “I’ve never seen the animal it comes from, but I’ve seen bits and pieces made from it. Ivory statuettes and things.”

“I bloody hate it here,” Dagonet says vehemently, and Gwaine can’t find it in himself to chastise the young knight. This village gives him the creeps. Everywhere he turns, blank eyes look back. It’s more than unsettling. 

It’s horrifying.

“We’re not going to learn anything else,” says Gwaine. “We should go back to camp.”

“Who would do something like this?” says Bohrs as they leave. “I don’t understand.” His voice breaks, and he coughs to cover it.

“It’s the children that get me,” says Dagonet. They’re nearing the camp, and voices are emerging from the gloom. The high, sweet laugh of a child rings out, as though she has never seen her mother turned to stone. “What are we going to do with them? We have, what, three villages’ worth?”

“Percy!” shrieks a voice, and a round shape flies from the trees, barreling into Percival’s legs. “You’re back!”

“Hello, Rob,” says Percy, kneeling down to see the child properly. “Is everything all right?”

“Sir Elyan taught me how to fight!” says Rob. “I’m going to revenge my mother!” He grows, baring his baby teeth like a little animal.

 _Avenge_ , Gwaine thinks tiredly. _Not_ revenge. The childish slip makes Gwaine want to roar at the sky. No one that young should lose their parents, and the monster has taken them anyway. Taken them, and left the children as if it were doing them a favor.

After dinner, Gwaine pulls Elyan and Percival aside. “We need to send the children to the citadel. They can’t keep on with us.” 

“Agreed,” Elyan says immediately. “But…”

“But?”

“They’re unreliable witness, aren’t they?” says Elyan. “You heard them, a monster with seven limbs and twenty mouths? And what if the red-haired woman isn’t the queen at all? Arthur should be sending ambassadors to Essetir right now, to verify.”

“Into what’s probably enemy territory?”

“They’d have to be good fighters.”

“We could be the ambassadors,” says Gwaine. “Is that what you’re thinking, El?” Elyan nods.

“We’ll need to split up,” says Percival. “Two of us to go and one of us to bring the children to Camelot.” They all glance at the fire, which is surrounded by piles of sleepy children trying to get warm. 

“They like you most,” says Gwaine.

***

There is a crone sitting at the dining table, her coarse white hair tied beneath a kerchief and her slumping body encased in a black lace gown. She pops up when she sees Gwen, and for a fleeting moment Gwen thinks this old woman is about to embrace her. 

“Your Majesty,” the old woman says instead. “I remember when you were but a young serving girl. Look at you. You’ve come so far.”

Gwen self-consciously touches her crown. It’s been years, but its weight still startles her whenever she wears it. “You wished to have an audience with me?” says Gwen, settling at the head of the table.

“I’m surprised you granted it,” says the old woman, sitting back down and crossing her arms. “I could be an assassin.” She senses knights tensing behind her, but Gwen waves them down. Even she doesn’t know why she feels so comfortable with this strange person.

“We’ve met before,” she guesses, mentally putting the woman into a stall at the market, the kitchens, the laundry. None of them fit. 

“We have,” says the woman, and rests a shaking hand on Gwen’s.

“Your Majesty,” says a knight, and Gwen shakes her head without looking away. 

“She won’t hurt me,” she says, and lets the woman rub warmth into her hand. “What’s your name?”

“Maude,” says the old woman, her voice creaking. Her face is pink, like it’s just been scrubbed, and this warms Gwen’s heart. The tattered dress, probably a formal gown handed down by an employee, and the stained kerchief only put Gwen more at ease. Maude reminds Gwen of the women she used to know before she became queen. The women who would naively don rags to meet the king.

“What can I do for you?” says Gwen. Maude smiles, revealing two rows of perfect white teeth. 

“All I wish is to serve in the royal household.”

“And so you shall,” says Guinevere.

Is Morgana using a spell? You decide.

***

Merlin is eavesdropping. He can’t help it, because Myfanwy hasn’t told him to shut off his hearing, and without permission to speak, he can’t let her know. So the words flow passively into Merlin’s brain, despite his better efforts.

“I told him no survivors,” says Myfanwy. She’s pacing the length of her throne room over and over again, the long train of her dress whispering across the floor. “He always does this, the fiend.” Merlin wraps his arms around his knees and rocks into the corner. He wishes he could just do what she wants. He doesn’t know what’s wrong with him.

“Your Majesty,” says a ragged, burned, dirt-streaked, no longer tear-stained woman. “I understand your concern, but what are children going to do against your army? Bite? They’re no threat.”

Myfanwy is going to scream. In a way, she’s just as frightened as Merlin. It’s not about the children, it’s about the fact of Merlin’s disobedience. If her control slips… 

May coughs nervously. “If I might say so, Your Majesty, it’s not so bad for the children to live, is it?”

“Oh, eat your fucking tongue,” Myfanwy says viciously. May’s mouth snaps shut and her jaw goes up and down. There are sickening squelching noises, and blood foams from her mouth. 

Merlin closes his eyes and tries to make himself even smaller. What if he’s as bad as May? He can’t help the whimper that escapes his mouth.

“Merlin!” says Myfanwy, running to where Merlin’s pressed against the chilly stone wall. “What’s wrong, darling?” 

Merlin angrily scrubs at his tears. Behind Myfanwy’s back, May is still attempting to devour herself with horrible gargling, moaning sounds. She must have been so bad to deserve such a punishment.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to, I didn’t want to, I’m sorry,” he says. “Please love me, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

Myfanwy sits down all the way, her skirts spreading like water around her. Her silk-clad arms pull Merlin into a tight embrace. Her necklace digs into Merlin’s cheek, but he doesn’t care. He’s too relieved.

“Of course I love you,” she says. “You stupid darling.”

“Please let me do something for you,” begs Merlin, and Myfanwy kisses the top of his head.

“Did you hear May? There are knights riding straight to our door. I’ll let you play with them.”

Merlin doesn’t want to play, but Myfanwy wants him to want to, and so he does. “Thank you,” Merlin sighs. 

***

I have a question for you.

Merlin must do everything Myfanwy wants. No exceptions.

So why can’t he kill the children?


	9. Many Faces

The monster’s name is Emrys. He has many faces, some without skin. Sometimes he talks, and it’s worse when he does. In one village, he left all the grown-ups bleeding from their ears. It’s a different horror each time, and it never affects the children. Here he turned people inside out, and here he took their voices, and over there he yanked out all their intestines.

As the stories about Emrys grow, so do the tales of his mistress, Queen Myfanwy of Essitir. She has all but declared war on Camelot, and the king has no choice but to send more men to the border. He and Queen Guinevere spend days in war counsel with members of the Round Table. Many more members are sent out. When Percival arrives with a horde of children, a taskforce is created to ride from felled village to felled village, gathering the orphans.

For Myfanwy, there’s one good thing about Merlin’s defiance. After he brings down a town, she can stroll in and separate the chaff. All the young sorcerers follow her back to her castle. She doesn’t worry about the distance; Merlin can take her from point A to point B with little trouble. She’s proud of that, as she is of most of his accomplishments. He was hobbled without her, unable to understand the true depth of his gift. Now he has her to lead him into the light.

Not much time has passed since Underhill burned. Myfanwy’s just very task-oriented. She likes to count out the toppled towns, sometimes adding as many as two or three in a day. And she’s always back in time for supper. 

Things are going well for her. Oh, she did lose a spy, but how valuable was May, anyway? The knights would have stumbled onto Myfanwy’s doorstep with or without her. There’s no need for guilt.

Meanwhile, Arthur Pendragon has just thrown up. He has five more minutes before the counsel reconvenes, and he doesn’t know if he’ll be able to leave his room. For a fleeting moment, he imagines dragging the Round Table into his room and presiding from his bed. He feels a little scared, as though he might actually do it and thereby complete his humiliation. 

Between one blink and the next, a rogue queen has burst into existence, bringing a so-called monster with her. Arthur is used to devoting at least a quarter of his thoughts to Merlin, but now he must fight a war. He has to devote himself to his people. But the memory swells, and no matter how hard he digs his fingernails into his head, he can’t stop it.

Merlin’s mouth is salty from sweat, and it should be disgusting, but Arthur’s too relieved to care. He’s finally kissing Merlin, his Merlin, and Merlin’s hands are sticky on Arthur’s face, and Arthur’s armpits are sweating and prickling, and this is the best moment of his life.

And then he takes his dagger from his belt and sinks it in below Merlin’s sternum. Their eyes meet; Merlin’s are filled with a muted terror dulled with shock. Arthur pulls down, splitting skin and muscle like he’s gutting an animal. Then he screams. He tries to put Merlin back together, but all his insides are spilling out, and Arthur's saying, "I'm sorry, I don't understand, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Merlin, I'm sorry," and the blood is everywhere and the intestines are writhing and Merlin says, "Just a flesh wound."

"But I killed you," says Arthur.

Merin, pale as death, head thrown back, eyes fluttering closed, mouth barely moving: "Thanks for nothing, sire."

Back in Camelot, Arthur lurches for the chamber pot. His stomach twists and burns with each retch. His hands and jaw are trembling. He wants someone to stroke his head. He wants to be young again, and have a nurse sit by his bedside telling him fantastic tales to distract him from the pain. Mostly, he longs for the moment when you’re tossing and turning in bed, pressing whatever you can against your stomach to stop the nausea, when you find that one magic angle where you don’t feel like being sick.

In her own quarters, the queen is arguing with Lancelot.

“My brother is walking to death’s door, and you don’t want me to help him?”

“You’re the queen,” protests Lancelot. He tries to tuck a lock of Gwen’s hair behind her ear, and she irritably tilts away. Lancelot sighs. “Camelot needs you here, ruling. If you left…” He trails off, but Gwen understands. Yes, Arthur is a popular king, but Gwen is the hidden—and sometimes not-so-hidden—head of the kingdom. When deliberating with the Round Table, it’s her decisions that are final. Ever since the day he appeared in the courtyard, drenched with blood and Merlinless, Arthur’s been a broken man. 

That doesn’t mean Gwen has to like it. “Isn’t a good ruler supposed to leave the castle times of war and command their people at the front?”

“Arthur will be there,” says Lancelot, and Gwen snorts. “Camelot needs you alive, Guinevere.”

“Go to the counsel chambers,” says Gwen, and points at the door. “I’ll be there shortly.” Lancelot bows and reluctantly leaves.

“Men,” says Maude, whose somehow procured a rocking chair and dragged it into Gwen’s chambers. She’s embroidering a bit of silk with pink flowers, and Gwen sits at the edge of her bed to watch her.

“Men,” agrees Gwen, rubbing her forehead. She could use a hot bath, or a strong drink, or both. A strong drink _in_ a hot bath. Now, there’s an idea. Maybe tonight she’ll have Sifa bring the tub. She knows she should get up and go preside over the counsel, but it’s strangely soothing to watch Maude’s oddly nimble fingers sliding the flash of silver needle in and out of the cloth.

“Did you have trouble with men?” says Gwen. “When you were my age?”

“Oh, I never cared for men myself,” Maude says lightly. She flashes Gwen a sly look through her sparse lashes. “I always loved the ladies.”

Gwen laughs with surprise, and then she can’t stop. She has to lean over and squeeze her stomach and desperately draw in air through the rictus of her grin. 

“Let it all out,” says Maude, and suddenly Gwen is crying. She hasn’t cried for so long that now she can’t stop. Maude just rocks and sews and rocks and sews and hums a bit of a pretty melody.

“I’m sorry,” says Gwen when the attack’s passed. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“Men,” Maude reminds her.

“How did I forget,” Gwen says wryly.

In her chair, Morgana wonders what would happen if she broke her glamor. Would Gwen scream? Run away? Fight? Obviously the last one, Morgana thinks, but she can’t help but hope for a fourth option: a long, tender kiss followed by a passionate night in the queen’s bed. The memory of their last night together rises from the back of her mind.

Morgana is finally queen, and Gwen pledges her allegiance. That night, they fuck so hard Morgana will feel it for days to come. And in the end, it’s all a ploy. Gwen was Arthur’s all along. 

So why can’t Morgana get that night out of her head? Gwen’s pleasure had been real, Morgana’s certain of it. And I might as well tell you, Morgana’s right. Gwen’s feelings were true, which made her choice that much harder. But I don’t think I have to tell you that Morgana wasn’t a very good ruler. Pendragon stock never are. And since Arthur wasn’t the one shooting down innocents in the square, who can blame Gwen for picking him? 

We can follow Gwen to the Table if you’d like, but all she’s going to do is talk about x troops and y location, and all the matters is the upshot: they will be sending a few thousand men to meet Myfanwy, wherever she is. Maybe you’ll be pleased to know that Arthur manages to contribute, and even gets in a few good points.


	10. Come Right In

They come upon the castle on the tenth day of their journey. It’s been arduous getting here, even with the surprisingly low amount of bandits and sorcerers and hedge knights spoiling for a fight. Gwaine and Elyan both agree that the lack of people is creepy, but there’s nothing much they can do about it. It doesn’t occur to them that someone is smoothing their way. Someone with a great amount of power, and a great amount of reach.

“I was held captive there, once,” says Elyan, looking up at the daunting fortress. He laughs a little. “I still remember Gwen’s face when she saw me there. She asked me what I’d done to get there in the exact same tone she’d use when I skipped my chores or came home late.”

Gwaine claps Elyan on the back. “Think you can make it here without your sister?” 

“Shut up,” says Elyan, laughing. It’s the last time he’ll laugh for a long while.

“Do we know how we’re getting in?” says Gwaine. 

Elyan shakes his head. “Arthur used tunnels, I think, but I don’t know the route.”

“That’s all right,” says Myfanwy. “You’re both invited to come right in.” 

***

Merlin is wearing a mask. It covers his whole head, without even any holes for his eyes. He has to strain to see through the material. There are knights, he knows, enemies from Camelot, but he can’t make out their faces. He’s grateful for Myfanwy’s hand on his shoulder, which grounds him whenever he gets afraid of them. Camelot knights terrify him, even when they’re being restrained by Myfanwy’s will. Once again, she hasn’t told him to close up his ears, so he sits on the floor beneath her throne and listens.

“That must be the monster,” one of the knights spits out. “Your psychopathic little pet.”

“Don’t be rude,” says Myfanwy. Her fingers trace Merlin’s neck, playing with the bottom of the mask. “He can hear you, can’t you, Emrys?”

Unsure how to respond, Merlin nods. 

“I don’t care if the whole world hears me,” says the knight, and his voice is so familiar, like a word on the tip of Merlin’s tongue. “And you’re no better than he is.”

“And what about you?” says Myfanwy, switching her attention to the other knight. “Do you talk?” He mumbles something. “I didn’t quite catch that.”

“I said,” he says, “that I only talk to people who are worth talking to.”

Myfanwy’s hand tightens around Merlin’s throat, forcing his breath into a rasp. He closes his eyes and wills himself not to struggle. 

“I’ll kill him, if you like,” says Myfanwy, and despite himself Merlin cringes. He doesn’t want to die. “On your word, I’ll squeeze the life right out of him.” The knights, confused and untrusting, say nothing.

“Well?” says Myfanwy. 

“How do we know he’s Emrys?” says one knight. “That man could be an innocent.”

“I give you my word.”

It’s a chance of saving one life against a chance of saving thousands, but Elyan can’t do it. “No,” he says. “Don’t kill him.”

“And your vote?” Myfanwy says to Gwaine. Gwaine looks down at the floor, at a spray of blood that has long since dried to brown. 

“Yes,” he says quietly. “Kill him.” Elyan’s mouth drops open, and the queen narrows her eyes.

Here is what Gwaine is thinking: he is standing with his sword still in its sheath before his enemy, with no desire to draw it. He knows he _should_ want to, but whenever those thoughts get too loud, Myfanwy touches the ruby around her neck and smiles and he would rather stand still than do anything else in the world.

He is thinking, _I would rather die than live like this._

“Kill him,” Gwaine repeats.

“Interesting,” Myfanwy says. “I wonder if you’d say the same thing if I showed you his face.”

“Show me, then,” says Gwaine. Myfanwy’s fingers tease the edge of the monster’s mask.

“Later, perhaps,” she says. “It’s time for supper.”


	11. I Knew a Sorcerer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW for a reference to rape

For someone with a curse on his head, Vortigern is doing remarkably well.

In shrouds of mist and snow, the Saxons are gathering. The forests rustle with their footsteps and echo with their voices. Soon, Vortigern will have an army to rival Camelot’s. With Myfanwy’s soldiers and sorcerers assisting, they’ll not fail.

Of course, Myfanwy thinks Vortigern is assisting _her_. Vortigern is sure it’s the other way around. As soon as he has Camelot, he’ll take the cold iron from the stores beneath the castle and end magic for good. A shackle for every sorcerer. As for Myfanwy’s creepy little monster, Vortigern thinks a pyre should do nicely. Myfanwy herself might be more trouble to dispose of, but he’ll find a way.

He pulls aside his tent’s flap and nods to his guards, Algar and Maida. Maida’s examines the ground. The silly bitch has refused to look Vortigern in the eye since he fucked her. It wasn’t that he’d enjoyed the sounds of her cries or the blood that flowed after, but she might have tried to enjoy it. Maybe he'll bed a different woman tonight.

He lets his eyes drift past her, taking in his camp. Something like pride swells in his chest. No one ever thought he’d come to much, but here he is in the shadow of Essetir’s mountains, surrounded by an army he gathered himself, an army he will march straight to Camelot's door.

His time is coming, he thinks. Camelot will fall, his curse will break, and everything will be as it is meant to be.

***

So Guinevere and Maude are left behind when Arthur rides out. Gwen desperately wants to come along so she may care for the wounded, but Camelot needs a ruler. Especially now, when the citadel is overrun with orphans and other refugees. Anxiety sits high in her throat, and it’s sometimes all she can do to keep her veneer of calm. There’s so much that needs to be addressed, including the famine coasting inevitably towards them when all the crops Myfanwy has burned don’t come to fruition. 

Isn't that like so many problems? Cause now, effect later. Sometimes, lying in the fallow point between the two, we forget there’s anything we can do to help ourselves. Nero fiddling as his city burns, Nicholas II playing chess with his daughters as the revolution tightens around them like a noose. But Gwen is no Nero, no Nicholas, no Cleopatra or Louis XVI. She is Guinevere Pendragon, and she will not let let her city fall.

We’ll return to Camelot later. Her knights are finally marching, followed by a good-sized infantry lured into battle by the promise of coin. The infantry and cavalry are very different. The former set themselves up in tents or luxurious bedrolls, eat the best meat, and drink the best ale. The latter must do with whatever can be spared: tattered blankets, ripped boots, imbalanced swords. 

“I’m not scared of any fucking monster, am I,” a farmer boasts to his friend as they slog through slush that the thousand soldiers before them haven’t managed to pack down. “Look at this.” He slides a hand under his tunic and furtively removes a small iron chain. 

His friend snorts. “A necklace?”

The farmer is undeterred. “That’s cold iron, that is. Best of the best. Touch him with one of these and he won’t be any more magical than Uther Pendragon.” 

“And how are you getting it on him?” says his friend. 

“Well, I’ll charge to the front, won’t I?” says the farmer. “Can’t let the pretty knights take all the credit.” 

“If anyone kills the monster, it’ll be Sir Lancelot,” his friend says firmly. “There’s no one better.”

***

That night, Lancelot comes to Arthur’s tent to talk. They pore over maps and discuss ways to fight not just one sorcerer, but hundreds.

“What if,” says Lancelot, and stops. Arthur sighs irritably and pushes away a roughly-drawn sketch of Essetir’s capital. 

“Yes?”

Lancelot picks his words carefully. “I knew a sorcerer, once.” Arthur, not entirely sure where Lancelot means to take this, nods. “We were friends.”

“Before you came to Camelot,” says Arthur. Lancelot shakes his head. 

“No, sire. He lived there.”

“Was your friend an idiot?”

Lancelot laughs for longer than Arthur thinks he should. “Maybe, but I always thought he was brave. He used his powers for good, knowing that at any moment his secrets could send him to an early grave.”

“And you would know all about keeping secrets,” says Arthur.

Lancelot pales, and Arthur is surprised at his own daring. He’s looked away for so long. He’s let himself be humiliated. He’s tired. And now here Lancelot comes with even _more_ treasonous activity. Arthur’s not his father; he turns a blind eye to the most innocuous uses of magic. But a sorcerer, a full sorcerer, in _Camelot_?

“You say _was_. Where is he now?”

“Dead,” says Lancelot. “A long time now. But my point is, he had magic, and he used it for Camelot. If we allowed sorcerers to practice openly—”

“No,” Arthur says automatically. “Magic isn’t natural; it’s our duty to curtail its corruption.”

“Nothing is more natural than magic,” says Lancelot. “It’s in the air we breathe, the food we eat. It comes from the land itself.” It’s the first time he’s said anything like this to Arthur, and it’s a shock, to say the least.

“I will not undo my father’s work.”

“Why not?” says Lancelot.

“Because he’s my father,” Arthur says hotly. 

“You’re strangling your kingdom,” says Lancelot. “Fighting with your hands behind your back.” 

Arthur looks closely at Lancelot, more closely that he has in a long time. “You’ve been thinking about this.”

“Yes,” Lancelot says quietly. “I have.”

There’s silence between them. Arthur is many things a king should not be: rash, ill-tempered, doubtful. But he has a trait shared by the greatest leaders: he listens.

“You’ve given me much to think about,” he says at last. “It will take time.” Lancelot bows his head.

“Of course, Your Majesty.”

They look at each other for an uncomfortably long while, until Arthur coughs and starts rolling up the maps. “We start early tomorrow.”

When Lancelot reaches the door, Arthur calls out, “Wait.” Lancelot looks over his shoulder.

“Yes, sire?”

Arthur licks his dry lips. “This friend. Did I know him?”

“Not at all,” says Lancelot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I looked up a map of the 5 kingdoms and Essetir's to the EAST of Camelot, but the good news is that this is fic, and I can put Essetir wherever I want to. 
> 
> Also: thank you so much to everyone who's reading and commenting on this fic! It gives me so much motivation, and I love you all so much.


	12. Being Very Bad

The cell could be worse. There could be a piss corner instead of a chamber pot, a cold floor instead of moldy hay. “It’s the little things, you know?” says Gwaine. The guard who brings him there, a terrifyingly tall man with enormous ears, shows no signs that he’s listening to anything Gwaine’s saying, but getting them to crack is half the fun.

In another cell, far away from Gwaine’s, Elyan is trying to sleep. He’s been placed further down in the dungeons to prevent any chance of the knights acting together. Unfortunately for Elyan, the deeper the cell, the worse the grime as the runoff drains into the lower parts of the dungeon. It stinks like shit, and the floor is wet. It’s not an ideal sleeping environment.

It gets worse when the monster arrives.

There isn’t any indication to show that another person has entered the cell, and when Elyan notices the masked man in the corner, he does a double take. His hand goes for his sword, but, obviously, it’s gone.

“Fuck,” mutters Elyan, crouching on his haunches so he’s level with the monster. “Are you here to kill me?”

The monster shakes his head. It’s creepy, is what it is, that mask that pulls down over his head. But for the promontory of the man’s nose, the fact of a face existing at all might have been in doubt.

“Then why are you here?” says Elyan.

(“Emrys loves me,” says Myfanwy, and Agravaine laughs. “Is that what you call it?”)

No, Myfanwy has not sent him. He is under no control but the constant dulling and warping of his personality. The truth is, this is the first time Merlin has been confronted with his past. How could Myfanwy know how he’d react?

It is also true that Merlin is terrified. His knees are shaking, his hands trembling. Elyan notices.

“What’s wrong with you?” he says suspiciously. The monster presses back into the wall. Merlin is thinking that Myfanwy is going to be furious. She won’t love him anymore. Not when she knows he’s gone to talk with one of the knights of Camelot.

(“What would happen if you let him go?”)

As for Elyan, he feels almost bad for the monster. There’s something familiar about the way he moves and the long lines of his arms and legs and torso. And he seems like such a quivering thing. “I’m not going to hurt you,” says Elyan, and it occurs to him how ridiculous this statement is. After all, he’s talking to a magical mass-murderer.

The monster whispers something, and Elyan shakes his head. “I didn’t catch that.”

“I said,” says the monster in a voice that’s afraid to be heard, “I’m being very bad.”

Elyan grits his teeth. “Is that what you call killing all the border villages?”

Killing? Merlin turns this over in his mind. It has not occurred to him that you could kill a village just as much as a person. Perhaps more so, because Merlin sees people’s golden souls soar into the sky, but he’s never seen a village’s. Merlin decides that tonight, the last night Myfanwy plans to strike before the battle, he will keep an eye out for it.

(“Nothing would happen,” says Myfanwy. “He’ll always want me.”)

“Are you going to say anything useful?” demands Elyan.

“Anything useful,” the monster says hoarsely. It’s a horrible moment when Elyan realizes the monster’s attempting to make a joke. It takes a lot to spook Elyan. Like Gwaine, he’s been a traveller, and has witnessed all sorts of eery things. Once he saw a ghoul pull off her face. But this is something else entirely. The best I can explain it is by using the Uncanny Valley, Medieval Edition: the monster is somewhere between creature and person, and it’s unsettling to watch it try to tip the scales to the latter. Elyan isn’t entirely sure what to say to it.

(“So there’s no harm in releasing him, just for a little while. Unless you’re afraid.”)

“Why do you wear a mask? Are you deformed?”

The monster looks around as though he expects the queen to pop out of the wall. “No,” he whispers. “I don’t think so.”

“So why do you wear it?”

“I want to.”

(“I’m never afraid,” says Myfanwy.)

Elyan rubs his forehead. He’s getting a headache. He needs water and food, and his back is screaming for a bed. “Why do you want to?”

“I…” Beneath his mask, Merlin frowns. Why _does_ he want to wear this mask? But then he remembers the red cloak this knight wore when he came. “I think you know me.”

“ _What_?” Elyan straightens. “What does that mean?”

But Merlin’s remembering that he's not supposed to be here. His heart pounds, and his lips quiver guiltily. He should be be in the garden now, but Myfanwy left him for so long, and after a while he stopped wanting to be there. 

(“So do it,” says Agravaine.”)

“I don’t know,” the monster mumbles. “I don’t know. I don’t know.”

“Your voice,” says Elyan. “I might have heard it before. Take off the mask.” 

The monster wraps his arms around himself and curls into the corner. His wiry hands clutch his shoulders. Elyan can’t look away. “Are you sure I know you? Fuck it, I might as well--I’m Sir Elyan.”

(Myfanwy shrugs. “Maybe I will.”)

A synapse that hasn’t sparked in years shakes itself awake. Another and another and another, called to action in a rising tide of thought. A name appears in Merlin's consciousness. “Gwen?” he says. Elyan starts.

“How the fuck do you know that name?”

“ _Gwen_ ,” says Merlin. He can’t catch his breath. “I know Gwen. I know Gwen.” He’s not sure whether he loves her or hates her. 

“Who are you?” demands Elyan. “Who the hell are you?”

Deep inside the folds and whorls of Merlin’s brain, a new thought emerges, stunning him with its scope. “I don’t want to be here,” he whispers, tears leaking from his eyes.

“You what?” says Elyan.

Hands shaking, Merlin tugs at his mask. It catches once on his nose, again on his hair. And then it’s nothing but the cold air on his naked face. 

It takes Elyan a moment to place him. It’s been a long time, and he never knew Merlin long. But it’s undeniable, and his face contorts in horror. “What the fuck?”

“Make it stop,” Merlin begs, reaching out. Elyan scuttles away.

“Don’t touch me. You’re…I don’t know what you are. You’re not Merlin.”

Merlin yanks at his hair, bangs his head against the stone. “Make it stop! Make it stop!” He has never been in so much anguish. He doesn’t want these new ideas, not when they hurt so much. He winds himself up and again slams his head into the wall. Elyan tries to stop him, but Merlin flicks him out of the way without moving a muscle. There’s blood pouring down Merlin forehead, pooling in his collarbones, and Elyan does the only thing he can.

He calls for the guards.

***

“I’m sorry, darling,” Myfanwy says, curling around Merlin in bed that night.

“It hurts,” Merlin says, touching his head.

“My love, my love, my love,” says Myfanwy, and kisses his bandage. She’s distracted, though. After all this time, she thought he would be completely hers. But when she let go of Merlin’s leash, he trotted straight to a knight of Camelot. It doesn’t matter, she tells herself.

She’ll never let go again.


	13. Interlude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Detailed CW in end notes

Welcome to the interlude. It’s no fastidious account of the French sewer system or rhapsodic monologue on the Russian countryside, but it is important in its own way. Our interlude is about a little girl named Elaine. Elaine lives with her mother and father in a small village whose name has been lost to time. In many ways, Elaine’s family is like all the other families: they milk their goat and make their beds and prick their fingers on sewing needles. In one way, they are very different.

Elaine’s mother, Anna, is a sorcerer. Because of her, no one goes cold in winter, or thirsty in summer. More people survive childhood than in any of the neighboring villages. The men and women are thankful for Anna’s help, and it’s common for Elaine to find a jar of preserves or a basket of eggs left in front of their door. 

Anna is eager to teach her daughter all she knows about conjuring everlasting flame and dowsing for water, as well as many other things, but Elaine finds hard hard work boring. She prefers to sit on her father’s lap in the back garden and listen to his stories. He’s a sorcerer, too, but he doesn’t like to use his gifts. Elaine begs and begs him for a demonstration, but he always shakes his head and tells her, “Darling, there’s some magic better left unsaid.” And Elaine must content herself by dreaming about what magic that might be.

Besides her parents, Elaine has her friends, and she has the woods, and she has the mill pond, and the orchard, and all the assorted games and loves of childhood. She likes to show off in front of the non-magical children by raising a breeze or lighting a fire, though her mother punishes her if she finds out.

“We aren’t any better than they are,” Anna says, hands on Elaine’s shoulders. “We’re just lucky.” And Elaine must agree it’s true.

And then they aren’t lucky anymore.

It starts with a golden autumn. It starts with the apples, redder than the breast of a robin, tumbling into Elaine’s outstretched hands, and it starts with the white frost on the green grass, and it starts with the queen’s baby. Usually, a royal birth is an excuse for celebration, but the queen has perished in childbirth, so there must be black cloth in the windows and a terribly long mass in the village church. After that, though, after that—Elaine’s mother lights up the sky with fireworks, and the children run around with sweets clutched in grimy hands, and their parents pass around mugs of ale and toast to Prince Arthur of Camelot. Elaine goes to sleep with his name on her lips, praying for his health.

And then it starts again, when a messenger rides into the village with the king’s proclamation. It’s not the one you’re thinking of. First there’s the banishment. Elaine and her family must leave Camelot immediately.

“I was born here, and I’ll die here,” Elaine’s mother says, and Elaine’s father agrees. Elaine would be relieved, but she’s mostly scared, because the village she grew up in is changing. No one comes to Anna for magic anymore, and all their friends turn from them on the street. One day, Elaine goes to buy buns and the baker who used to pinch Elaine’s cheeks and tell her she was getting to be a big girl won’t even look at her.

The next time, there is no messenger. There are only the knights of Camelot, who ride into the village with their crimson cloaks billowing behind them. They ransack each house, splintering tables and cracking open walls, searching for anything that could be construed as sorcerous. Anyone with a book is immediately suspect. Remember, this is before the printing press, and a single book costs a small fortune.

Elaine’s family never stood a chance. The knights rip through their home like it’s nothing to them, like Elaine’s entire world is simple trash. With wide sweeps of their arms, the knights knock everything to the floor. The spice jars shatter, the books thud like shot birds. It’s all for show, anyway. Everyone knows who the witch is. As the sun sets, the knights drag Elaine’s family into the town square while the townspeople look on like ghosts. One of the knights makes a speech about weeding out the undesirables. 

“Will anyone speak in their favor?” says the knight when he’s done. No one will. The pyre is made from the village’s books.

One of the knights rips Elaine from Anna’s arms, even as they both scream and reach for each other. Elaine’s father doesn’t fight at all, but his eyes are dark. 

“Please, please,” Elaine begs, clinging to her captor as he carries her over the hanks of pages ripped from her family’s own books. “I don’t want to die, please don’t let me die, please, please.”

But he has his orders.

Chained with cold iron and tied upright to the pyre, the three of them encircle the pyre like children playing Ring a Ring o’ Roses. If her arms weren’t tied to her sides, Elaine be able to reach out and hold her parents’ hands, but the knights have not allowed them even this.

The torch is lit. It advances towards them, bobbing and and tilting. There is a moment while it hangs over the tinder that Elaine thinks might last forever. And then—

There is no description for the pain of combustion. All I can do is say, imagine the flesh on your arm melting and multiply that pain by half a million, and you may be close to understanding what it is to burn. 

Luckily, Elaine dies quickly of smoke inhalation. Her mother goes next. But her father—

Her father is the rock the ocean breaks over. In the midst of the flames, he stands unharmed. With a roar, he yanks himself free of his bindings. The knights draw their swords, but none dares to stop him as he pulls the wreckage of his daughter from the flames. 

He gathers her up in his arms and kisses the top of her burned head. “My love,” he says, “my love, my love, my love."

And then he calls upon the magic his own mother passed down to him when he was nothing more than a corpse with a caved-in head.

“My life for yours,” he says into her ear. “My life for yours. My life for yours. My life for yours. My life for yours.” He says it as his throat begins to burn, and he says it when he starts to choke on blood, and he says it when his heart stutters, and he says it when Elaine’s heart turns over in her chest. And so she is born for the second time, in the arms of a father who gave her all he had.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Being burned alive


	14. Keep the Dark at Bay

Guinevere Pendragon wakes with a start and struggles against her sweat-soaked sheets. Her head aches, and her throat hurts so much she can barely speak. Tears leak from her eyes. She wants her father, she wants her old bed, she wants her father, she wants her bed, her father, her bed, her mind too tired to think anything else. 

There’s a rustling from the arm chair. “Gwen?”

Gwen turns over, shoving her face into her pillow. Her shoulders shake. A cool hand rests against her neck.

“You’re burning up,” says Maude. Gwen moans. “I know, Gwen, I know.” Maude rubs Gwen’s forehead with her thumb. “I’ll get you a wet cloth. You just lie here and relax.” And Maude is as good as her word, coming back with a deliciously chilly strip of linen and a goblet of water. It hurts to swallow, though, and Gwen pushes the goblet away.

“Should I call for a physician?”

Gwen shakes her head. The only one she’d want right now is Gaius, and she hasn’t seen him since…she can’t even remember. 

It’s so mundane, she thinks. Her kingdom falling to pieces, and she wakes up with the kind of cold she used to get as a child. Her lips twist, and a muffled sob escapes. The bed dips as Maude perches on the edge. Cool fingers stroke Gwen’s forehead, and the tenderness could make Gwen cry. 

She wants Morgana. The thought springs fully-formed into Gwen’s head. She wants Morgana to be here, wants Morgana to take care of her, the way they used to take care of each other when they were children. The force of her desire scares her, and she clings to her pillow as if it’s a raft in a stormy sea. There’s a noise going up and down, and as long as Gwen’s ears follow it, she’ll be all right. And then she realizes that _she_ ,’s making the noise. It’s somewhere between a wail and a scream. 

After that, she’s quiet, though she can’t smooth her face; it crumples without her permission. There are tears and snot between her cheek and her pillow. Maude must notice this, because a new wet cloth is swept over Gwen’s face, starting with her forehead and mouth and ending with her nose. Then Maude makes Gwen lift her head, even though it hurts her neck to move, and replaces her old pillow with a new one.

Gwen wonders what she’s done to deserve this old woman and her gentle love. She slowly shifts one of her hands out from beneath her and waits for Maude to take it. When Maude does, her skin isn’t as thin or papery as Gwen remembers. In fact, it’s as smooth as Gwen’s own. In the morning, she’ll chalk it up to her fever, but for now she holds a young hand in her own young hand and drifts off into a troubled sleep. 

Her husband is also having trouble sleeping. They’ve reached Essetir’s eastern border, but a thick fog hangs over it.

“Sorcery,” he says, though he needn’t bother. They all know what it is. 

“What now?” says Lancelot, and Arthur ruefully shrugs.

“Now,” he says, “we wait.”

So they pitch their tents and unroll their beds and light their fires, and try to keep the dark at bay. If you have ever lain awake in bed until dawn crept through your window, you understand what a difficult job this is. Sometimes it is dark outside and sometimes it is dark inside, and I have found that it is worse when it is both at once.

It’s not just Arthur with a gasping, grasping heart. All the thousands of men (and few hundred women, including soldiers and camp followers) cannot sleep in the face of the oppressive fog. Whispers roll over the mile-long camp in waves. They are all afraid, from the king to the littlest drummer boy. 

What’s left of the Round Table convenes in Arthur’s tent. Percival is in Camelot with the orphans, Gwaine and Elyan are missing, so tonight it is Arthur, Leon, and Lancelot. They drink mulled wine gone cold and pore over their maps of Essetir.

“I think we might have to press through the fog,” says Arthur.

“No,” says Leon. “You were right to stop us here. The further we go into Essetir, the greater the their advantage. We don’t know the strange magics of their land.” 

Arthur sighs and props his head on his fist. “I hate not doing anything.”

Lancelot nervously licks his lips. He doesn’t have to speak; Arthur knows what he’s thinking.

“After all this time, would they trust me?” he says. Lancelot doesn’t have the answer to that.

“Who would trust you?” says Leon, and Arthur chuckles joylessly.

“The sorcerers.”

“The _sorcerers_?”

“We have thousands of people in our camp,” says Arthur. “I’d expect at least a few to know their way around a spell.”

Leon’s mouth drops open, but he has nothing to say. It’s not that he doesn’t understand. In fact, after weeks of worrying how they’ll fight an army of sorcerers, he’s almost relieved to realize they might have what we now call an ace up their sleeve.

Except. Except the people of Camelot hate magic. Except sorcerers are thought to be murderers, and rapists, and thieves. Except Camelot sorcerers are untrained, and disorganized, and most importantly, afraid. Tricking magic users into giving themselves up was exactly the kind of thing Uther would do. Arthur hopes his people know him better than that, but, given that he barely knows himself, he’s not counting on it. 

“You won’t do it, of course,” says Leon. “It would be madness.”

This is the wrong word for Leon to use. After all, what is a man who murders his best friend if not insane? Arthur’s been doubting his sanity for years, now, and he worries that all his decisions are tinged by some strange internal logic that makes sense only to him.

Lancelot, though. He trusts Lancelot, and Lancelot is looking at him with confidence in his eyes. Confidence Arthur doesn’t deserve, but confidence nonetheless. Arthur thinks of Lancelot’s friend, and the fear he surely felt. He consults the lines in his palms, but they tell him nothing.

There’s a ruckus outside, and the three men leap to their feet, hands going for their swords. The tent flap rustles, and Arthur prepares to meet whoever it is with steel. And then he nearly drops his sword with shock.

“Hello, everyone,” says Gwaine, an easy smile on his face. “What did I miss?”


	15. Everything's So Clear

Arthur can’t believe his eyes. Neither can Leon or Lancelot. The three of them stare at their returned friend as though he is a ghost. He may as well be—none of them have said it, but two knights disappeared into enemy territory isn’t exactly a precursor to wonderful news.

“What?” says Gwaine, taking in their stunned stares. “It’s me!” He lopes across the tent and plucks some dried fruit from the bowl in the middle of the table. “Mmm, these are delicious. I’ve had barely anything to eat since I left Camelot.”

“But where were you?” says Lancelot.

Gwaine shrugs, and when he swallows the fruit, he says, “I didn’t get anywhere. Just wandered around like an idiot for days and days until I stumbled onto the camp.” 

Arthur doesn’t sheathe his blade. Neither do the other knights. They can all feel the weird tension between them and Gwaine, and none of them is going to let down his guard until there’s an answer.

“What happened to Elyan?” says Leon. Gwaine carelessly tosses his head.

“I don’t know. We split up. He’s probably still heading west. What are these?”

“Nothing,” says Arthur as he hastily gathers up the maps. As much as it pains him, he doesn’t trust the man who’s just walked in. There’s something eery about this situation. While Gwaine eats, Lancelot slowly wanders in the direction of the tent door. At the last moment, he peeps out. Arthur’s heart drops when he sees Lancelot stiffen. The flap swings back into place, and Lancelot turns a bright smile on Gwaine.

“It’s wonderful to have you back, old friend.” He advances on Gwaine with his arms open. At the last possible moment, he lunges forward with his sword. In an instant, Gwaine’s is up, and their blades crash against each other.

“Now, why would you do that?” says Gwaine, like a petulant child. “I was so happy to see you.”

“He killed the guards,” Lancelot pants, forcing Gwaine back. 

“Gwaine,” says Arthur, taking a few steps forward. “Think about what you’re doing.”

“But I am thinking,” says Gwaine with his usual easy smile. “Everything’s so clear.” He slides his blade out from under Lance’s with a _schwing_ , and the two of them cautiously circle each other. Lance has the clear disadvantage because his heart isn’t in it. No one wants to hurt their friends. Arthur and Leon step up behind him. It would be suicide for Gwaine to attack, but he doesn’t seem worried.

“Tell the truth, this time,” says Arthur. “Where have you been?”

“As I said,” says Gwaine, easy deflecting a swipe from Lance’s blade. “Wandering. You should be more hospitable. I haven’t had a bed to sleep in for ages.”

“You killed Camelot men,” Leon says angrily. 

“A necessary sacrifice,” says Gwaine. His smile is so still that Arthur’s stomach churns. There’s something truly terribly awful about Gwaine’s affect. It’s like his soul has been scooped out, leaving nothing behind but the flesh. Arthur refuses to believe that this is really Gwaine, but he can’t figure out what strange spark is animating him.

“A sacrifice for what?” says Lancelot, his voice low. “What are you here for, Gwaine?”

“Not much,” says Gwaine. He sheathes his sword in one swift motion. Lancelot keeps his own out, but make no offensive move. 

“Yes?” he says.

“Not much,” Gwaine repeats. “Just this.” He removes his left gauntlet and throws it at Lancelot’s feet. Arthur and Leon both rush for it, but Lancelot is too quick. In a moment, it’s in his hands.

“When?” he says.

“At dawn,” says Gwaine. “I’ll see you then.” No one knows what to say.

***

Myfanwy’s knights and sorcerers are camped beneath the castle. They will march in just a few hours. She doesn’t know when she’ll see her home again, and she walks through the passageways and rooms with an air of grave melancholy. Merlin can whisk her back, she supposes, but the truth is, she’s outgrown Essetir. She’d rather been queen of the much larger, much more successful Camelot. These past five years, though, have not been terrible. She’s had her monster, and her magic, and her people.

Her monster. He’s asleep right now in his cell-that-is-not-a-cell, resting his powers so he can unleash all he has on Arthur Pendragon’s army. She wonders if splitting her troops and Vortigern’s is a mistake. If it is, it’s too late now. She’s made her decision. She has to be right.

She’s wrong about one thing at least: her monster isn’t asleep. Merlin is sitting awake in bed, staring into his palms. He’s felt restless since…since the day he can’t remember. Myfanwy’s erased the cell, erased Elyan, erased his moment of insane sanity. He’s left with a painful bump on his head and the uneasy feeling that he’s not being good enough. He vows to be good tomorrow, to fight his best and to make Myfanwy love him forever.


	16. I Put My Faith in You

When dawn breaks, they meet in a clearing chosen by Lancelot. No one is following Gwaine anywhere.

“Don’t do this,” Arthur says.

“This is our best chance to capture him honorably,” Lancelot says quietly. They’re paces away from Gwaine, who’s running his sword along a stone. “I won’t attack him when he’s unprepared, but someone has to stop him.”

“Stop him from what?” says Leon, knowing there won’t be an answer. Myfanwy is too good at controlling people for rumors of her abilities to pass the border between their kingdoms. They have nowhere to even begin guessing at what’s happened to Gwaine. 

“Are we ready?” says the man in question, tossing the stone away and turning to look at his three former friends. Arthur claps a hand on Lancelot’s shoulder, and Lance looks around at him.

“I put my faith in you,” Arthur murmurs. Lancelot nods and pats Arthur’s hand before joining Gwaine in the clearing. They bow their heads to each other and pull out their blades. Lancelot is focused, his eyes dark and his mouth grim. Gwaine is still smiling guilelessly, moving as lightly though he’s in a simple tunic instead of chain mail. Leon and Arthur both find themselves holding their breaths.

Gwaine swings first, as Arthur knew he would. It’s not a light stroke, and Lancelot grunts when he parries. Before he has a chance to recover, Gwaine’s on him again, swinging and swinging like a man enraged, though his amused face might be better suited to a party. Arthur fears that Lancelot won’t attack at all, but consign himself to the defensive. Luckily, Lance realizes that he has to fight as though Gwaine is a stranger. His first lunge knocks Gwaine back; his second nearly send Gwaine’s sword flying.

“You’re getting better!” says Gwaine as they circle each other again. Lancelot doesn’t respond. The next time he attacks, Gwaine is ready. The fight on and on, the swords’ clashing ringing through the clearing. At last, Gwaine’s face shifts to something more determined. They are both red-faced and sweating, but neither shows any sign of slowing.

“Jesu,” Leon curses. It’s the first time Arthur’s heard Leon take the Lord’s name in vain (they are both Christian, but Leon is one of the more devout members of the faith). Arthur’s thoughts briefly light on Merlin, who used to curse constantly. What Arthur doesn’t know is that Merlin never maligned his own religion of the Triple Goddess. Surprisingly, Arthur’s thoughts almost instantly return to the fight. Ever since they started marching, it’s been harder to devote time to thoughts of Merlin. 

Lancelot gasps as Gwaine lands a particularly hard blow on his sword arm and barely lurches away before the second blow hits his wrist. Arthur heart pounds, and he clenches his jaw. He can sense Leon sending him nervous looks, but he doesn’t return them. He can’t. He’s absorbed in the battle before him, eyes flicking back and forth between the two men.

They fight for hours beneath the rising sun. They fight until they shake with exhaustion. They fight until they’re both stumbling. They fight until they cannot stand any longer. They fight until noon is bright and hot upon them.

And then, between one slash and the next, the fight goes out of Gwaine. He’s already falling when Lancelot’s sword strikes his head.

***

Merlin’s feet hurt and he feels a little nauseated from shuffling the army like a deck of cards, rearranging the sorcerers and common soldiers in space until Myfanwy decides they’ve found the best possible position. The queen is a perfectionist, and she doesn’t take in how disoriented she’s making her army. A few men and women step aside to vomit and return to find they’ve entirely new neighbors. When she finally lays a hand on Merlin’s arm and tells him to stop, he sags in relief.

“You’ve done well, pet,” she says, and kisses him on the cheek. Merlin smiles and rubs his face against her shoulder. Dawn is just beginning to break, and he’s filled with hope for Myfanwy. He can’t wait for her to strike down the monster that is Arthur Pendragon. A memory flashes before him—stocks, again, Arthur laughing, again—and he trembles a little. It’s not pleasant to remember a time before he was appreciated.

Like all proud rulers, Myfanwy is leading the charge. Her warhorse, a massive creature with rippling muscles and fiery nostrils, is called Doom. Myfanwy has always had a keen sense of the dramatic. Merlin’s own horse, a mare named Ribbon, is almost half the size. He likes Ribbon, though. Like him, she’s quiet. Like him, she’s faithful. When Myfanwy lets him, he feeds her carrots and fills his heart with her simple joy.

Now is not a time for carrots. The border, and Arthur’s army, are only a day’s ride away, and Myfanwy is getting impatient. Bare-branched trees and dark hedges whip past them as they ride. One advantage of having a smaller army is its transportability, and Myfanwy is taking full advantage of that. They will all reach the border tonight and camp on the Essetiran side of Merlin’s fog. His magical reach is getting better and better, and he’s been able to maintain the fog from miles and miles away. Still, Merlin is breathing more easily. The closer they get, the smaller the strain on the spell.

“How are you feeling?” Myfanwy says to him. Merlin reflexively digs his heels into Ribbon’s side, but Myfanwy just speeds up to ride alongside him. He sighs.

“I don’t want to see the king,” he admits. “I’m afraid.”

“Oh, my love,” says Myfanw, eyes soft. “You are so much more than he could ever imagine. He has no power over you anymore. When you see him, you will end Arthur Pendragon.”

“End him,” Merlin echoes. His fingers prickle with magic. He can almost feel the lighting descending from the sky and rising from the earth, almost feel it coursing through his nerves to his fingertip and into Arthur’s heart. Myfanwy always knows just what to say to cheer him up.

***

Morgana has a Dream. Some of her Dreams show the future, but this one shows the past…

Driven by an instinct she doesn’t understand, Elaine plunges her hand into her father’s chest, cracking the sternum and ripping the flesh. But where his heart should be, there isn’t the throbbing mess of muscle she expected. Instead, her hand closes around something cold and hard and glittering.

She rises like a phoenix, blood and melted flesh rolling off her like so much muck. The edges of her father's hardened heart cut into her palm, but the tighter she holds it, the weaker the minds around her grow. They stumble and fall before her power.

Shall I describe the vengeance she wrought? Do you want to hear how she sent the villagers one-by-one into the flames? How she made the soldiers run each other through? How she turned the sky white with her rage? Shall I describe the children cowering before her, or the way she cannot touch them no matter how hard she tries? Shall I describe her father’s sacrifice winding through her blood, staying her hand when she tries to do the one thing her father won’t allow? Do you want to know of the village left behind? The burning husks of men and women, their cracked porcelain cheeks, their burned-out eyes? The children left to cower in the rubble of their homes?

Shall I describe the days and weeks Elaine walks west, her feet tearing and bleeding and toughening until they can tear and bleed no more? Shall I describe the clearing in the woods of Essetir where she finds a young man in royal garb? How he asks her what her name is?

She almost says Elaine, but that is an old name, bitter with ash. Although she can speak Old English—they called it English then, of course—her village spoke a different tongue, native to parts of Essetir. When her dying father held her in his arms, when he said, “My love, my love, my love,” he was really saying—

“Myfanwy,” says the girl. “My name is Myfanwy.”


	17. Through the Fog

It is morning, again, and the fog is everywhere. Even Merlin can’t see through its thick whirls. It’s horrifying, and claustrophobic. Sluggish dread creeps through his veins. Myfanwy isn’t talking to him; she isn’t talking to anybody. She sits proudly on her horse, with her head tilted to the dark sky and her lips pressed into a bloodless white line. Every hundred soldiers is a sorcerer to light the way with golden globes of magic. It would be easier if Merlin were allowed to lift his spell, but Myfanwy won’t allow it. She doesn’t want the king to see their arrival until it’s too late.

Merlin’s fingers spasm, and he realizes he’s been clutching his reins. He tries to loosen his grip, but when he does, his hands start shaking. His stomach is a cold lump. Tears blur his vision, and he squeezes them back. He won’t feel this pain, he won’t, he won’t.

Slowly, the sun breaks through the fog. They’re reaching the outer limits of the spell, and soon the sorcerers can dim their lights. Merlin’s heart races, and his throat swells. He can taste bile. The last swirls of the haze break over his face, and the morning light spills over his upturned face. He stares up at the blue sky and feels its beauty in his soul. 

“It’s time,” says Myfanwy, her eyes smoldering. The tiniest bit of smoke curls around her nostrils. Her ruby glows, casting an eery red light over her face. She holds her sword aloft and cries, “FOR ESSETIR!” Her voice rolls over the whole army, raising a cheer. They charge down the slope at the Camelot soldiers streaming from the trees.

A battle is wild and confusing. There are the sounds—metal clashing with metal, skin ripping, screams in all directions. There are the smells of blood and rain, and the burned scent of Myfanwy’s magic. She’s larger than life and flowing with fire. 

Merlin doesn’t realize it, but he is just as intimidating as Myfanwy. He cuts down swaths of people with a wave of his left hand, the right hanging on to the reins. He doesn’t like to kill, but he of course he will for Myfanwy. Camelot soldiers crack open beneath his gaze, their brains spilling out the tops of their skulls. He opens the ground and sweeps in at least a dozen men. When Myfanwy first had him kill on such a large scale, it nearly broke him. But every day Myfanwy told him how much she loved him and how she didn’t want to have to kill him, and eventually he came around.

Still, his blood doesn’t rise until a dying infantry-woman stabs her sword into Ribbon’s belly. The horse collapses, spilling Merlin over its head. He vaporizes everyone in a ten-foot radius and cradles Ribbon’s head in his heads. His thumbs stroke her velvety nose. “Ribbon,” he says, and then he vaporizes her, too. Across the field, Myfawny turns back to burning.

We’ve seen this battle before, and I know you’re waiting for its end. It doesn’t come quickly or easily. There is so much destruction, and so much death. The sky weeps over the warring men and women, so their eyes are slick with blood and tears and clouds, and the ground is wet enough to slip on.

Myfanwy’s flames stutter, and whisper glides through the wrong side of Merlin’s ears: _Quickly._ He sends a wind to the clouds and forces them back over the forest. A group of Camelot’s finest rush at him while he’s distracted, but he sets the wind on them, blowing them backwards.

Arthur, though magicless, is a force of nature in his own right. He tears a path through the Essetirans, his sword raised before him. Arthur is furious, at Myfanwy, at life. His blood rushes in his ears. Somewhere, there is music, and he doesn’t know if it is real or in his head. The lives he takes cling to his sword. There is a flash of Lancelot de-horsing three men at once, and there, that’s Leon, his horse rearing. Arthur can feel each heartbeat of his army, can sense its spread in his bones. For a wild moment, he experiences the perfect clarity of war. Then, like when the eye doctor slips the wrong lens over your eye, everything shifts back into blurry uncertainty.

It would be nice if everyone who was uncertain about fighting laid down their weapons, but that’s not how the world goes, so Arthur keeps fighting, his mind shouting, _Camelot, Camelot, Camelot!_

When he sees the queen for the first time, it takes a moment to recover. Her long legs are eating up the ground, and her fire is eating everything else. He tries to gallop towards her but the congestion of people gets in his way, and he loses sight of her. A little later, he sees what he thinks might be the monster: a dark figure on a dark horse, the air around it thick with magic. He grits his teeth and raises his sword and—

And that’s when the battle calms. The fighting quiets. Grown men and women slip off their horses and curl up on the ground. Myfanwy smiles over the leveled hordes. “King Arthur,” she calls, and the soldiers split to give him room. Arthur dangles his helmet from loose fingers. His mind is fogging. He wants nothing more than an audience with the queen, and she has so kindly provided him a path. His heart full of goodwill, he marches towards Queen Myfanwy of Essetir.

 _That_ ’s when he sees Merlin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyy guys, I'm SO sorry about the delay! I just started college and it's c r a z y. Why am I tired all the time?? Is that just how college is?? I can't drink any more coffee, I swear to God my college is selling us rocket fuel in coffee cups. Anyway, I want to get back to posting every day (we're about halfway done I think), so yay!
> 
> Now I'm going to go catch up on my creative writing hw, hopefully this time the professor doesn't drop it a letter grade for it being "confusing, no one really got it". Whatever, I still like it. 
> 
> Thus ends the chronicle of my life since I last posted. Thank you guys for still being here and still reading!!


	18. The Servant Dies

You are Arthur Pendragon. You love a servant. The servant dies. He was the pin that held your life together. Without him, you are an open wound. Slowly, though, you thread a needle through the tatters of yourself. You pull tighter and tighter until you are, if not put back together, something that can pass as unbroken. 

You are Arthur Pendragon, and you are on a battle field, and you see a monster wearing the face of your lost love, and your stitches split, and you think, _How dare she show me this?_

Myfanwy’s magic is scattered throughout the battfield, and there is enough rage to pierce through for Arthur to break through her hold. He lunges for Myfanwy. At the last moment, the monster materializes before her. Arthur’s sword slides into its neck and sticks. The monster gurgles, blood pooling in its mouth, and when it collapses, it’s like watching Merlin die all over again. Arthur waits for it to transform back into its natural state, but it clings to Merlin’s face even when Arthur shoves his foot against its side to yank out his sword.

“My monster!” says Myfanwy. 

“You’re finished,” says Arthur, the point of his sword at her throat. “Yield, Myfanwy.” 

Myfanwy smiles. “Drop your sword, Arthur.”

“Why should I?”

Her smile wavers. “Drop it.”

“No.”

There’s a shiver in the air between them, and then something terrible happens to Myfanwy. Her skin reddens and purples and bubbles. Giant yellow blisters pop, oozing a pungent pus. Melted skin drips from her face. She gapes at Arthur like a fish out of water. Her throat is burned closed. Arthur’s sword wavers. 

Magic is capricious. The right sorcerer can wrangle it to a purpose, but if magic’s not used the way it wants to be, it’s apt to switch owners. The spell in Myfanwy’s father’s heart was meant to give life, not take it. It took a dead child and made her a queen, but when the time came to tuck the spell away inside her own chest, Myfanwy failed. And so her father’s magic wants its freedom.

Magic is capricious, and magic is strong, but it doesn’t always get what it wants. Myfanwy’s ruby cracks open, one half falling to the ground by the monster’s cheek. The other half isn’t so lucky, and Myfanwy clings to it. It glows brighter and brighter until Arthur must fling an arm over his eyes. Just when he thinks his eyes will go up in flames, the light vanishes, taking Myfanwy with it.

On the ground, the monster stirs. Trapped in horror, Arthur just stands there as the thing wearing Merlin’s face sits up. It blinks its wide blue eyes and holds its half of the little red rock to its chest. Arthur’s sword-hand trembles, and he almost drops his weapon. The thing, the monster, Myfanwy’s tool, looks too close to the man Arthur knew. But it’s impossible. Merlin’s dead. Arthur killed him.

The monster wheezes, and Arthur almost kneels to help. Then the monster’s scream finds its footing. It knocks Arthur back with its inhumanly high sound. The ground around it cracks, and Arthur has to scramble not to fall. The monster is drawing breath for another cry when a soldier darts from the dazed masses. He’s got something in his hand, a scrap of metal, but he barely gets close before the monster throws him back with just its mind. The metal goes flying.

The monster flails, its limbs slamming against each other. It claws at its face, drawing blood. Arthur raises his sword again. He’ll take of this now, while the monster is distracted. 

“No!” yells Lancelot. He’s not close, but desperation strengthens his voice. “Don’t kill him!” The monster screams again, and the air quivers. It’s only the monster’s face that stays Arthur’s hand until Lancelot arrives. He can’t look away from its sickening familiarity. The longing he’s been suppressing rises back up, nearly choking him. Longing, and disgust for this creature that dares wear Merlin’s face.

“Give me a good reason, Lancelot,” says Arthur, eyes still fixed to the unhappy thing. 

Lancelot holds up thick folds of chain. Cold iron, Arthur realizes. “Let me.” Lancelot walks forward cautiously but openly, like he’s approaching an upset friend. 

Like’s he’s approaching a friend.

Lancelot had a friend—

Both his sword and the penny drop. _Oh_ , thinks Arthur. This isn’t a monster that looks like Merlin.

This _is_ Merlin.

Arthur can’t breathe. His lungs are like two stones. The monster—Merlin—the monster—

“Don’t worry,” says Lancelot, kneeling before Merlin. “It’s only me. Do you remember who I am?” Merlin lashes for him, but he just died, and his coordination isn’t amazing. Lancelot, who is faster and stronger, catches Merlin in a chokehold. It’s takes only a few seconds for Merlin to slump. Lancelot hastily rolls Merlin to his stomach so he can shackle his hands behind his back. 

Arthur can’t look at this anymore. His brain has been shocked into silence. He contains a great nothing, and looking at Merlin makes the sensation worse, like a vacuum’s taken place of his heart.

The battle is won, but Arthur feels like he’s lost everything all over again.


	19. I Want Her

He swims through gradations of pain. It’s like streaks of music, the way you can press a key on the piano and watch the haze above it. The lower notes are dark, heavy clouds that cling low to the ground. Above those are the sharp rays of higher notes, yellow-red in the middle and then just red, red as a knife to the back or a sword to the throat. For a while, he is formless; his entire world is agony. Slowly, he becomes aware of something heavy pressing against his chest and stomach. It threatens to squash him until his ribs collapse and his sternum meets his spine. He wants to push it off, so he tries to lift his arm. He can’t find it. He can’t find any of his limbs. He gasps for breath, but his lungs don’t have space to inflate. Why can’t he move, why can’t he—

A word filters down from an unimaginable height. At first, he ignores it, but it doesn’t stop, and eventually his ears can’t help but hold on to it. “Merlin! Merlin!”

He manages to pull a noise through his ruined throat. Then there’s a light slicing his eyes, and he moans again, louder. Immediately, the light goes out.

“Merlin? Can you hear me?”

His eyes. He has to open his eyes, but the air is like acid. He’s never been this hurt before; his magic is constantly patrolling his body, fixing bumps and bruises before they can get too serious. Even when _he_ split him open and left him to die alone in the woods, even that hurt less than this. But something’s restraining his magic. 

“That’s right,” the voice says, and there’s a hand cupping his head. No, no, no, he doesn’t _want_ to be touched, he wants everyone to stop _touch_ ing him, all their hands and their fingers and tongues. He can feel nails at his back, a hand between his legs, and he dredges up his tongue to touch the palate of his mouth.

“Nnn,” is all he manages, and he has to rest before he tries again. “Nnno.”

“It’s all right now, I’m here—”

Merlin braces himself and forces his eyes open. “ _No_.” The face hovering above his withdraws, and Merlin’s head is gently placed back on the pillow. They’re in a dark, warm space. With difficulty, Merlin looks from side to side. The walls are fabric. They’re in a tent, much smaller than Myfanwy’s. Where is she? Does she need him? He tries to sit up, but there’s that pressure on his chest, even though he can’t see anything but a woolen blanket. Maybe the weights are in the blanket? He tries to reach for it, but his hands are bound to something behind his head. He tugs as hard as he can, which isn’t very. His arms are aching, he realizes.

“Cold iron,” says the man at Merlin’s bedside. “I’m sorry.” Merlin almost frowns, but it hurts the muscles in his face.

“Who…”

“You don’t remember me?” 

He does look familiar, Merlin realizes. He’s seen those eyes before. 

“Let me introduce myself, then. I’m Lancelot.” 

“Where’s—” Merlin pauses to cough. It sends pain bouncing around his rib cage. “Where’s Myfanwy?”

“Dead, I hope,” says Lancelot. “But I don’t think we’re that lucky.”

There’s something Merlin has to do. He has to do it right now because she told him, “If I die, you can’t be on your own,” and he knows that he has to do it now before he doesn’t want to anymore. But even as he thinks this, the desire disappears as his brain rewires itself. He doesn’t think of it in exactly this way, but he’s aware of the entity he calls his mind changing in some new and incalculable way.

“I want her,” he says. Lancelot looks pained.

“Merlin, she controlled your mind. She made you kill people.”

Merlin closes his eyes. He knows that no matter what he says, this man will never understand. There are many ways a mind can be conditioned, and magic is just one of them. Myfanwy has been the only person to show him kindness for five years, and Merlin depends upon her. And now that he thinks about it, he can’t imagine Myfanwy dying. It would be impossible, like the sun falling from the sky. He’ll be all right when Myfanwy gets to him. She saved him from death once before, and she’ll do it again. But he also feels no urge to attack anyone here. He does, however, want the chains off, and rattles them as loudly as he can.

“I know. I’m sorry,” says Lancelot. “I can’t take them off completely. But I’ll unshackle them from the headboard.” Merlin lies quietly as Lancelot does this, resting Merlin’s arms by his side. Merlin’s flooded with relief just from the removal of this small strain. He can already think a little more clearly. In fact, he can’t remember the last time his thoughts moved so fast. It can’t be said for most people, but dying did Merlin a world of good. 

After a while, when it’s clear Merlin’s not going to say anything, Lancelot says, “You’ve been in and out of it for three days now, but this is the first time you’ve really woken up.”

Is Merlin supposed to respond to this? There’s nothing he wants to say. Lancelot tries to take Merlin’s hand, but Merlin growls. I might as well tell you that Lancelot is taken aback. Nobody’s ever growled at him before, and it’s this, more than anything, that impresses upon him the years Merlin’s been gone. Before, on the battlefield, Lancelot could pretend that as soon as Myfanwy let go, Merlin would be all right. Already he seems much better than the horror that killed so many a few days ago. But the Merlin he knew wasn’t like this at all.

Then Lancelot makes a mistake. Partly because he doesn’t know what else to say, partly because he wishes he knew if it were true, he says, “Arthur will be glad to know you’re awake.”

Merlin flings himself at Lancelot, whose chair goes backwards. They roll around on the ground, Merlin hissing and biting, Lancelot trying to throw him off without hurting him. Merlin raises his arms and strikes Lancelot across the face. The cold iron bloodies his lip. He raises his arms again, but Lancelot is firm, now, and easily pins Merlin to the ground. 

Myfanwy, Myfanwy, he needs Myfanwy right now, right now, right now, he can’t think, he can’t breathe, he needs something to do, he needs a task, he needs her so badly, her needs her to save him—

It’s all Lancelot can do not to recoil from Merlin’s plaintive cries: “Please, please, I’ll be good, I promise I’ll be good, just don’t give me back to _him_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I finish this story I'm writing another bookstore au, it'll be cute and sweet and no merlins will be harmed in the making of it


	20. The Orchestra of Sobs and Moans

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! I know people are getting a little confused, and if you want to brush up on;
> 
> a) What Arthur thinks about Merlin, read chapters 6 and 9.
> 
> b) What Merlin thinks about Arthur, read chapter 4.

Arthur had loved Merlin as someone indispensable to himself; he had loved Merlin the way he would love a god who stepped down from the stars. He’d thought Merlin to be the bravest, kindest man he knew. Whenever he’d seen Merlin, scrubbing the floor or eating an apple or just sitting with his head tilted toward the sky, Arthur had had to restrain himself from saying, “You’re perfect.”

And then Arthur killed him. Or that’s what Arthur has believed for five long years. You’d think the guilt would seep away now that he knows the truth, but he’s already found greener pasture. If he’d told Gaius what happened in the woods as soon as it happened, Gaius would probably have recognized that something was afoot. They would amassed an army, ended Myfanwy’s reign before it began. But Arthur had been too ashamed to admit what he’d done, though now he sees the obvious sorcery.

At least now Arthur understands what his father meant by _magic corrupts_. It wasn’t that possessing magic had corrupted _Merlin_ ’s soul—he couldn’t believe that, wouldn’t believe that—but the _fact_ of all that magic concentrated in one person… There was a reason Camelot kept its magical artefacts in the crypts. In the wrong hands, they’d be dangerous.

In the wrong hands, Merlin _was_ dangerous.

Arthur thinks that if he were a stronger man, he’d slit Merlin’s throat right now. But then he remembers, that's _Merlin, my_ Merlin! and his heart leaps. For a second, he doesn’t care that Merlin lied, he doesn’t care that Merlin was a monster, he wants to stride into Merlin’s tent and gather him into his arms.

According to Lancelot, this would be disastrous.

“He’s terrified of you.”

“Of me,” Arthur says dully. They’re two days away from Camelot, though much of the army lags behind, wounded. Arthur’s in his tent, the heavy brocade muffling the sounds of chatter from outside. “It wouldn’t be because I killed him twice, would it?”

“Honestly, I don’t think so,” says Lancelot, taking the chair across from Arthur’s and earnestly leaning forward. “He thinks you’ll…”

“What?” says Arthur. Lancelot sighs and rubs the bridge of his nose.

“He thinks you’ll touch him.”

“Touch him?”

“In places he doesn’t want touched.”

“Why…”

“I think he’s confusing you and the queen of Essetir.”

“You think he’s…Lancelot, what did she do to him?”

“I don’t know any more than you, sire.” Lancelot eyes are bright; he’s close to crying. Arthur’s fist clenches on the table. If he’d gone to Gaius. If he hadn’t been such a self-absorbed idiot. If he’d kissed Merlin sooner, loved him better, held him tighter…

“And what about the gem?” Arthur says. “The half-rock that fell from the queen’s neck?”

“He doesn’t seem to know it’s there,” says Lancelot, sitting at last. He rests his callused, war-beaten hands on the table. “But that thing has a mind of its own.” He holds up his palm, revealing a bright scorch mark. Despite himself, Arthur winces.

“I think it’s what saved him,” Lancelot continues. “Either that, or his own magic renders him immortal.”

Arthur’s about to respond that of course it’s the gem, no human can survive death on their own, not even the strongest sorcerers—but then he remembers the way Merlin looked that hot summer day with his stomach split open and his eyes glazed. Although perhaps the gem saved him then, as well.

“The day that Merlin disappeared,” says Lancelot, and Arthur stabs him with a look. There is a short list of people who do not quail at Arthur Pendragon’s glare, but Lancelot is on it preservers. “What really happened that day?”

Arthur’s nostrils flare, and his mouth tightens even more. “That’s enough Lancelot. I’ll see you in the morning.”

Lancelot, who has almost never said or done a rude thing, almost rolls his eyes. “Goodnight, Your Majesty.” Arthur nods.

Outside, Lancelot wanders past the tents of noble families. He doesn’t realize where he’s going until he’s outside it. It’s the temporary infirmary, where wounded nobles are being treated. Even in Arthur’s Camelot, it pays to be high-born.

It smells like pus and blood inside, and Lancelot must hold his arm over his nose until his sense of smell adjusts. His heart twists. Lancelot is struggling with his own brand of guilt. He has reviewed his fight with Gwaine again and again. If Lance hadn’t struck that last blow, if he’d been more careful, if he’d fought better and ended it sooner…

At least Gwaine’s fever is declining. For the past few days, he’s soaked his bedroll within minutes. But he’s is still far from the picture of health. With his head wrapped in bandages and his face ashen, he looks like some sort of ghost. Lancelot cares for Gwaine himself. He knows things about healing from Gwen, and he tries to apply them when he can. Out of all the players in our story, he is the kindest.

“I’m back,” he says under the orchestra of sobs and moans. “How have you been?”

Gwaine’s eyes are closed, but his lips flutter. Lancelot leans forward, eager to hear whatever Gwaine has to say. But it’s a false alarm. After a moment, Gwaine slumps back into sleep.

***

In the middle of the night, cloaked with shadows and a little magic, Morgana creeps into the throne room and sits upon the throne. As she sits there, she is wondering what it takes to be a good queen.


	21. Abeyance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys!!! I'm so so sorry for the delay in getting this chapter up! College is still being crazy hahaha. Thank you so much to everyone still reading this story, it means so much to me that you are.

At first, Gwen thinks the approaching soldiers are knights of Camelot. Messengers have already arrived with news of their victory; who else would be marching upon the castle in Camelot’s colors?

It’s Maude who warns her. They are in the North Tower, braving the freezing winds for a glimpse through the tallest window. “We must close the gates,” Maude says suddenly, her wrinkled face drawn. “Let no one in or out.” 

Gwen turns from her window to Maude. “These are our men. They’re citizens of Camelot.”

“It’s a glamor,” Maude insists. “They’re Saxons. You must give the order.”

“And how would you know this?” says Gwen, eyes narrowing. She’s grown to be very fond of her elderly companion, but she’s learned that enemies can curl themselves into your heart. Maude would hardly be the first to betray Gwen, though she might be the oldest.

“I’m a Seer,” says Maude.

“A sorceress,” says Gwen.

“If you want me to be,” says Maude. “Are you going to have me killed?”

Gwen bites her lip, then strides to the staircase.

“Your Majesty, where are you going?”

“To close the gates,” says Gwen.

***

Gwaine is dreaming. He is dreaming of a place without ceilings or walls or floors, a place without color that extends everywhere. It is a place of nothingness; so nothingness, in fact, that he has no body. His consciousness is suspended like an insect floating in a stoppered bottle. He is in abeyance. 

He’s been dreaming of this nothingness for a long time, now, and yet he isn’t bored. Just as there is nothing to interest him, there is nothing to exhaust him. He finds himself neither angry nor joyful. Perhaps the best word is _peaceful_. He is filled with peace, overflowing with the stuff. He could contentedly hang here forever. He has no need for a body. In time, he almost forgets a time he had one at all. 

He almost forgets, and then—

Then here something in Gwaine’s nothing. It crouches like a vaguely human-shaped spider, its sharp shoulders drawn up around its ears and its legs tensed as though it might spring. Not an inch of skin shows. It’s dressed in a long black tunic and black trousers and black gloves and black socks and has a black mask over its head. It sits unusually stilly. 

It’s the creature from Myfanwy’s court. It’s the monster.

“You’re being so loud,” rasps the monster. Gwaine tries to respond, but he still has no mouth. “Your soul is everywhere. Move on or come back, but stop _hovering_.” It waits, and Gwaine wonders why this creature is allowed to have a form, and Gwaine isn’t. The creature responds as though it can read Gwaine’s mind. “You appear here as you perceive yourself, so perceive yourself a form.”

Gwaine instinctively shies from the idea. He doesn’t want to be something, it’s so nice just to float here. But it’s not quite as nice with the creature here, so Gwaine concentrates on making himself a body. He gives commands to limbs that aren’t there until finally they swim out of the ether, his fingers curling and his muscles tightening. When he has a mouth he says, “Where are we?”

The monster stands. “You’re deciding whether or not to die.”

“Oh,” says Gwaine. There’s a pause. “Do you think I could perceive some ale?”

“If you want ale, you’ll have to wake up,” says the monster. “But make your decision. I don’t like having your soul everywhere.” 

“Am I back in Essetir?” says Gwaine. 

“No. You’re with your friends.” The monster turns away. “It is I who am away from home.”

“I fought Lancelot,” Gwaine says softly. A bubble of guilt presses at his chest. “I tried to kill him. Your queen made me want to kill my friend.”

“Lancelot must have deserved to die,” the monster says firmly. “Myfanwy is kind and good.”

Gwaine remembers the queen playing with the monster’s mask, asking them if she should kill him. And the monster loves her still? “She controlled you too, you know.”

The monster is on Gwaine in a second. “Don’t talk about our queen this way.”

“She’s not _my_ queen,” snaps Gwaine, taking a step back. 

“She will be soon,” says the monster. “She will grind the Pendragons to dust.”

“Don’t talk about our king and queen this way,” Gwaine parrots. “Look, friend. I saw you in her court. She kept you like a dog on a leash.”

“I’m dangerous without her,” the monster says immediately. “I can’t be trusted. I don’t think well. I’m stupid.” 

“Quite a lot of reasons she gave,” says Gwaine, feeling pity for this monster. He’d put money on its head being as scrambled as eggs over a campfire. 

“This isn’t about me,” says the monster. “Are you moving on or not?”

Gwaine smiles. 

***

Weeks ago, we saw Morgana stand on the hill overlooking Camelot, contemplating Gwen. Now Vortigern stands where Morgana once stood, contemplating the same queen.


	22. I Will Fight For You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Usually, I wait to post a chapter until I've answered all the comments. But this past chapter I've received such thoughtful, moving comments, and I want to be able to respond to them with the attention they deserve. (College, homework, you guys know the drill haha.) Thank you for reading!

And so Arthur arrives to witness the Saxons’ siege of Camelot. It is not much of a consolation for Arthur to know the Saxons cannot stop up the water source beneath Camelot or steal the winter’s worth of food from the storage rooms. He doesn’t know what to do with the time it buys him. The battle at the border was no ordinary battle, and its strong magic left Arthur’s army in tatters. They left a third of the soldiers on the battlefield and lost even more on the way back to Camelot.

Lancelot is direct. “You need help, Arthur. Magical help.”

Arthur’s expression doesn’t change, though he begins sharpening his sword with more force. Sparks fling into the air before sizzling on the snow-dusted ground. Lancelot kneels on this frozen ground and waits until Arthur finally throws away his rock in disgust.

“You want me to use him like Myfanwy did?”

“ _No_.” Lancelot must pause to reorganize his thoughts. “I just meant you should talk with him.”

Talk with him. It used to be that Arthur could talk to Merlin whenever he wanted. At any time, he could call his manservant into his room and ask his advice. Not even his advice, just his words. Arthur had loved Merlin’s words. He had clung to them the way Theseus clung to his golden string, following it through the labyrinth and into the light.

“He’s terrified of me,” said Arthur. “He thinks I start conversations by throwing goblets at people’s heads.” 

“Sire—”

“No, it’s true. I used to throw things at his head.” Arthur refuses to look at Lancelot and tilts his sword so it catches the sunlight and scatters it over the snow. He is remembering a patrol in similar weather. Merlin had been so cold that he told Arthur his ears would break off. And what had Arthur done? He’d hidden the firewood, eaten Merlin’s portion of stew, and chosen the better blanket. If Merlin had been truly suffering, unable to move for the cold, Arthur wouldn’t have—

But that wasn’t what happened. Arthur’s thoughts are zooming around his head, battering his brain and knocking into each other before spinning away in an entirely different trajectory.

Lancelot claps Arthur on the back and stands. “Talk with him, Arthur.”

***

Merlin isn’t having a great time. With his magic locked in, he’s a prisoner in his own body. He is so used to sensing the world around him that it is terrifying to walk out into the bright noon sunlight. Someone in the trees could be pointing an arrow at his head, and _he wouldn’t know_. He slips his hand beneath his tunic and feels for the red gem half-embedded in the center of his chest. It’s the last thing he has of Myfanwy—they took his clothes, his shoes, his Essetiran livery—and to him, it is a promise. A promise that Myfanwy will return for him.

A voice rises above the din. Merlin recognizes that voice, and almost trips over his own feet trying to get back into his tent. He draws the flaps and flings himself into his bedroll. The blanket goes over his head. He is ashamed of his weakness. Sometimes he listens to campfire gossip, and they speak of the horrible monster captured by King Arthur. It makes him burn with anger. 

“Merlin?” It’s the knight whom Merlin fought with, the knight who comes back every day and night with food and kind words. His name is Lancelot. Merlin remembers more every day, but Myfanwy has large swaths of memory have been ripped down, and it takes time to rehang them. He remembers a dense, thundering creature ripping through the trees, and he thinks he may have had something to do with Lance’s lance. But that brings him too close to thinking about Arthur.

“Merlin,” Lancelot says again, coming to stand by the bed. Merlin curls his wrists underneath him. The cold iron bracelets cut into his thin chest. His ruby throbs warningly. He wants to go to sleep. In his sleep, his soul is able to slip the confines of his body the tiniest bit, and he is free to wander through the cloud of dreamspace created by so many people sleeping in such a concentrated area.

But Lancelot isn’t going to let him sleep. “How are you today?”

Lost, lonely, confused. His heart is a lump of hurt. He squeezes his eyes shut, trying to hold in his agony, which whips at him from the inside. He knows what voice he heard beside Lancelot’s, and now it’s like there’s cold iron squeezing at his neck, choking him. Suddenly, there’s not enough space beneath the blanket, and he throws it back. A breath gets caught in his lungs when he finds himself unable to exhale, as if his lungs have been turned to stone. Black dots swarm his vision. He teeters in this moment endlessly. Then his lungs let go, and he screams with no voice. 

Lancelot wishes Gwen were here. She would know what to say to Merlin. Truthfully, Lancelot is frightened. He watches Merlin rock back and forth, screaming silently as if he is choking. Unsure, he slowly sits on the floor by Merlin’s bedroll. His hand hovers over Merlin’s shoulder. He never rests it, but keeps it there until, shockingly, Merlin hurls himself into Lancelot’s chest. He clutches Lancelot’s tunic until his knuckles turn white, and he cries until the tunic’s soaked. Lancelot realizes that in between cries, Merlin is whispering something. 

“My love, my love, my love,” he says to himself.

***

It feels to Gwen that the citadel gets smaller every day. Around every corner is a noble displeased to be trapped in the city, or a hungry petitioner, or a opportunist trying to present their plans of war to the queen. The pressure in the city bears down on everyone; fights erupt everywhere. Sometimes Gwen’s heart beats so fast it wakes her up. She develops a throbbing pain in her eyes from writing by candlelight, and her hand cramps so hard it spasms. But no matter what she writes or counts or counsels, they are still besieged by Saxons. Send the great magical army to Camelot’s western border, and let the ordinary Saxons jump in and take the city while it’s least protected.

“A bait-and-switch,” Gwen says out loud. Maude turns from the window.

“Hmm?”

“Nothing,” says Gwen, putting down her quill and rubbing her forehead. It feels like she’s running out of time, the way the room steadily lightens with the rising sun. “Oh, I feel so stupid.”

Maude is at Gwen’s desk in an instant. She takes Gwen’s hands in hers. “Why, Your Majesty?”

Gwen laughs bitterly. “I’m like a princess in a children’s tale, waiting for my prince to come rescue me.” 

“But you’re not waiting,” Maude says. “You’re keeping the city sane.” 

“We need to train more fighters,” says Gwen. “I’d fight, if I weren’t the queen. Someone has to live to take care of this mess.” She looks so weary as she says it, neck bent under the weight of her head.

“I can fight,” says Maude.

Gwen stares. “Aren’t you a little…”

“Old?” says Maude, her green eyes shining. “You forget I am a sorceress.” Gwen grabs her arm and squeezes the way her mother squeezed Gwen’s arm when she tried to run into the road.

“Never say that again.”

“I’ve hidden before,” says Maude. “I won’t hide again.” The first rays of sunlight stream into the room, enfolding Maude in their glow. 

“Then _stop_ ,” cries Gwen, rising from her chair. The two of them stand there, the queen with her heavy purple gown and elaborate braids and young hands, and the old woman with her rags and drooping face. And then the two of them stand there, the queens of Camelot. (Well, one queen, and one-former queen. But we’ll let it slide.)

“I’ll fight for you,” says Morgana Pendragon.


	23. The Merlin-Shard

It has been five years since Arthur and Merlin last had a conversation, and Arthur isn’t sure how to start. He stands before the entrance to Merlin’s tent. If his knees don’t shake, it is only because he has spent the last two decades doing away with weakness. _A king is not afraid._

Arthur pushes aside the flap and walked into the tent. It takes him a tense moment to locate Merlin, who is sitting cross-legged in the corner. His face is still. Even his eyes remained fixed on the same point in space. Nevertheless, Arthur wants to be on the same level with Merlin.

“I’m going to sit now,” he says, holding up his hands and letting his sleeves fall back, so Merlin can see he doesn’t have any weapons. Slowly, Arthur crouches to the ground, finally settling in the same cross-legged pose as Merlin, and looks him right in the eye.

“I thought you would attack me,” says Arthur. “Lancelot says you hate me.”

No response. Arthur doesn’t even think Merlin is blinking. “Your mind isn’t here right now, is it,” says Arthur. He sighs and rubs wearily at his eyes. “I wish I knew where you went to. Not just right now, but before. In Camelot. You used to disappear sometimes, when you were supposed to be working. Gaius always said you were at the tavern, and I’d punish you for that. I knew you weren’t…” Arthur loses his courage for a moment, his eyes dropping to the floor.

A king is not afraid.

Arthur looks back at Merlin, whose eyes are still unfocused. “I knew you weren’t at the taverns,” Arthur says. “I thought you were spending time with someone else. Some girl or boy. Someone who wasn’t me. And I—” Arthur’s voice breaks, and it takes all he has not to look away. “I punished you for that.”

Is it Arthur’s imagination, or did Merlin’s eyes just flicker? He swallows hard and keeps going. “Maybe it’s true that you with someone else. Maybe it’s not. It doesn’t matter. I withheld myself from you, forced you to be both my friend and my servant, teased you, bullied you, threw things at you, starved you, _belittled you_. And then I punished you for wanting someone else.”

Merlin’s lips twitch. Arthur leans forward. “What is it? Merlin, what is it?”

A sound with more shape to it than mere breath comes from Merlin’s mouth. He is repeating it over and over, and as he does it gets louder, and Arthur realizes that Merlin is saying a name.

“Freya?” says Arthur.

“Strawberries,” says Merlin. Deep inside his brain, a synapse flickers to life. Its message spreads from axon to dendrite to axon, ancient nerves singing with electricity. Here is what it says:

They are floating on their backs in the lake, only it is warm instead of ice cold. Freya is holding his hand.

“There’s something going on out there, you know,” she tells him. “Someone is talking to you.”

“So?” says Merlin, propping himself up on an elbow (because this is the sort of thing you can do in your mind). “I gave him my body to talk to.”

“Merlin!” says Freya, propping herself up too. “That is so rude. You should always welcome visitors.”

Merlin snorts. “I don’t want to be out there,” he says. “I don’t think I'd be very good company.”

“Really?” says Freya. “But _I_ love talking to you.”

“I’m different out there,” Merlin explains. “My thoughts don’t work as well. I don’t know why they’re working now.”

“Oh, I can tell you that,” Freya says, splashing him a little. “It’s me. You got me back from _her_.” She says the last word with scorn.

“I did?” says Merlin.

Freya frowns and sits all the way up, Merlin following suit. “D’you really not know?” she says. “I thought you would remember here.”

“I don’t remember much,” Merlin says honestly. “Who is the her you keep talking about?”

“Oh, Merlin,” Freya says sadly. “You’re just a splinter of a shattered brain. The rest of you is out there, in your body.”

“I don’t understand,” says Merlin.

“You’ve been in hiding a long time,” says Freya. “I think maybe you should go out there.”

“Something tells me I don’t want to meet the rest of myself,” Merlin says.

“There is a chance…” Freya pauses. “I don’t want to frighten you, but there is a chance that you wouldn’t make it out there. You might get buried.”

Merlin clicks his tongue in irritation. It is the first time he’s done so in five years. “I’m not going to give up,” he says. “I need to know who I am, Freya, since I’m clearly not myself.”

“Then I give you my favor,” says Freya. She leans in close enough that her lips brush his ear. “The sword is where you left it.” She kisses him on the corner of his mouth, and Merlin is just turning to kiss her back when suddenly he is looking at Arthur Pendragon.

***

Morgana rolls off of Gwen, and they both look at the ceiling.

“I cannot believe we just did that,” says Gwen, her cheeks burning. “I should be in war counsel.”

“Even a queen must sleep,” says Morgana, tracing around Gwen’s belly button. Gwen shivers and closes her eyes and feels Morgana’s hand slide across her abdomen.

“Is that what you call this?” Gwen says breathlessly. She already wants to go again. She does not think she has ever felt her body this clearly. It has been so long since she had sex with someone she was attracted to that she had forgotten what it was supposed to be. She remembers now.

“I can help you with the sleep,” Morgana murmurs in Gwen’s ear. “There’s a potion that will keep you awake for weeks. No side effects.” She presses her hand between Gwen’s legs, and Gwen moans. With Arthur, Gwen had to remember what she was supposed to do. He tried to please her, and she obediently produced the sounds she thought she should be making. If Gwen had stopped paying attention, she would have lain there like a stone.

With Morgana, she couldn’t stop paying attention if she tried.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” Gwen whispers, curling up against Morgana and resting her head on Morgana’s chest so she can feel her heartbeat.

“When this is over,” says Morgana, “we are going to christen every room in this castle.”

“We got to a lot of them before you disappeared,” Gwen points out. “Do you remember when I held you down on the throne and fucked you?”

Morgana shudders. Gwen can feel how fast Morgana’s heart is going. She knows that Morgana is ready again, and—

There is a rapping at the door. “Your majesty!” calls a voice. “You are needed in the counsel chambers.”

“On you go,” says Morgana. “You have a city to save.”

***

The Merlin-shard is, to put it lightly, terrified. First of all, he is about one foot away from Arthur, and he really wasn’t expecting Arthur to be this close. Secondly, his body is in agony. Each breath is like a sword ripping through his lungs. Thirdly, and most importantly, there is someone else in his body.

Merlin and the monster stare at each other. The memories pile like snow: death, and pain, and hideousness. “She was right to give you a mask,” Merlin spits. “You’re disgusting.”

“Who gave me a mask?” says Arthur. “Merlin, what are you talking about?”

Merlin’s head jerks up, and he stares at Arthur, wild-eyed.

“You’re looking at me,” Arthur says, the same tone one might use to say, “You’re flying.”

“Don’t let it get to your head,” says the Merlin-shard. And then he is gone.

The monster nearly flings himself into the tent wall to get away from Arthur, but for once, the king of Camelot is not his biggest fear. He knows what just happened, sort of. He knows that a part of himself emerged the darkness, and he knows that he, the monster, frightened himself away. He is so terrible that he cannot even love himself. The monster weeps.

***

While Gwen is with her counsel, Morgana climbs to the tallest battlement. The guards ignore her, their eyes slipping right past her. If Morgana were the piddling witch she used to be, that would be worrisome. It would mean that anybody with a scrap of magic could fool the guards. But Morgana is not an amateur anymore. She has spent her years in isolation honing her craft, learning its subtleties, what hurts it and what helps it thrive.

Then again, the guards of Camelot have never been particularly bright bunch.

The wind is a driving force today, and Morgana almost feels that she could fly right off the roof and into the sky. She braces her arms on parapet and looks down at the citadel. Using a spell of her own creation, Morgana casts her vision down the side of the castle. It zooms down the stone wall into the roiling mass of refugees. Everywhere is dirt, and blood, and strife, and hunger. This is not a place for children, and yet three-quarters of the people in the courtyard are younger than thirteen.

Morgana bows her head, fighting back tears. “All they want is to be loved,” she says, but she is the only one who can hear her own voice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who's still reading this story! I'm sorry for leaving you guys hanging for so long. I've been doing a ton of writing lately, but it's mostly been for school or for money, and I was kind of forgetting how much I love writing for myself. 
> 
> Also, thank you guys so much for all your wonderful comments. You make me so happy <3


	24. All the Hurt He Has Suffered

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is both extremely short and extremely skipable. It deals with the aftermath of sexual abuse and, um, all the other stuff that's been going down.

The monster—he will never call himself _Merlin_ again, because Merlin is a man and the monster is an abomination—refuses to move or speak. He curls up agains the wall of tent, filled with intense unhappiness. He is trying to listen to his mind, but there is too much noise up there. All the hurt he has suffered turns round and round his head like water swirling around a drain.

Some hurts are worse than others, though it’s not always the same ones. More and more, the monster finds that the deeper horror comes from his memories of Myfanwy. He thinks about the things she made him do. More than once, he killed parents before their children. One time, he was made to punch into a man’s chest and yank out his heart.

 _Made to._ The monster turns these words over and over, because he does not entirely understand them. Because of course he did things for Myfanwy, he would do anything for her, he loved her. She’d saved him from Arthur.

She’d also hurt him. She hurt him a lot. There were things that she did… 

The monster scrapes at his skin and tries to breathe. He doesn’t want her anymore, but she won’t listen.

Before Myfanwy, Merlin had kissed exactly three people. Will, one. Freya, two. Arthur, three. He hadn’t had time for anything else. 

Myfanwy did more than kiss. 

The monster cries so hard that blood pours from his nose. He cries until he loses his voice. He cries and cries and cries.

Sometimes, there are pains you must experience to understand. He wouldn’t have known that anything could hurt like this. He keeps thinking that it would be better if it were one thing or the other. If he didn’t have the guilt of killing thousands, perhaps he could bear the violations. If he didn’t have the violations, he might be able to hold up the guilt. Together, they crush him.

We are’t going to comb through Merlin’s memories. It is enough to step back and look at the shape of them. And the shape of them is this:

Merlin cannot sleep with his legs apart.


	25. Last Chance

Morgana creates a tempest.

Just a small one, you understand. About five feet across and packed with sharp, swirling detritus. She stands on the tallest tower, her arms pointed toward the sky as the tempest roars and spins madly above her. It grows with each rotation as Morgana spools more air currents into the storm. 

It might seem like easy magic, but Morgana is currently doing three magical things at once:

Forming the tempest.  
Sharpening her vision.  
Reinforcing the old wards that clung to the citadel like cobwebs.

It’s the last spell that requires the most concentration, because five Saxon sorcerers are trying to break down the gates. Morgana grits her teeth and the tempest rises into the air. She directs down over the gates and directly on the sorcerers’ heads. The storm yanks them off the ground, and they struggle madly. 

Gwen emerges from the staircase, her face grim. “You’re using magic.”

“I’ve been using magic since I got to Camelot,” says Morgana, but Gwen shakes her head.

“I mean, you’re using magic where everyone can see you. Now they know there’s a sorcerer in Camelot. We’ve lost the element of surprise.”

Morgana ignores her. It’s hard to keep five grown people in a tempest, and her arms are starting to ache. She raises them higher and higher, waiting for Gwen to say stop. Gwen never does, and the sorcerers are now fifty feet high. Everyone in the citadel and everyone in the Saxon camp can see them twisting in the storm. She can hear Gwen swallow.

“What shall I do with them, Your Majesty?” says Morgana, just a twist of irony in her tone. 

Gwen bites her lip, just as she used to as a child. Then she raises her chin. “This is war, Morgana. Drop them.” 

***

It doesn’t take long for news of Camelot’s sorcery to reach its army. Not knowing any other experts on the subject, Arthur consults Merlin. 

“It seems we will have magic on our side after all,” Arthur says to Merlin. “No thanks to you, of course.”

Merlin, who has crawled back into his cot, doesn’t answer. Arthur wasn’t expecting one, anyway. “There’s no way to know what the sorcerer wants. They could be fighting for Camelot, but it is more likely that they are fighting for themselves. Or maybe Gwen has sold her soul to the devil for his protection.” Arthur pauses and then says, as if in response, “No, I don’t think she’d do that either. Though who knows. I don’t know anyone as well as I thought I did.”

Merlin’s blankets rustle as he sits up. He blinks slowly, as if his eyelids are weighed down. Merlin plucks at his blanket, staring at Arthur with his cold eyes.

Arthur’s hands—his warrior hands, calloused and strong—begin to shake, and he holds them in his lap. He licks his lips, but cannot think of anything to say. He is afraid that anything he says or does will scare Merlin back into his own head.

“What is it?” Arthur says when he can bear it no longer. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Merlin goes from plucking at the blanket to scratching at his arm. Arthur can see sores from where he has picked at the skin before. 

“It wasn’t you,” Merlin says at last. 

Arthur barely breathes. “Who wasn’t me?” he says.

“Merlin wasn’t afraid of you,” says Merlin.

Fuck. “Merlin,” Arthur says tentatively, “you are Merlin.” He reaches out a hand, and Merlin flinches. Arthur drops his arm, embarrassed.

“I’m sorry,” he says, but the damage is done. Merlin has slipped back into his head without even lying down. 

Lancelot is waiting outside. “How was it?” he says. 

Arthur shook his head. “We have to forget about him fighting, Lancelot. He can’t do it.”

“I was thinking about it,” says Lancelot, “and I think you should remove the cold iron shackles.”

“Is that a jest?” demands Arthur, channeling his grief into rage. “He would rip us to pieces in seconds.”

“The plan was always to remove them,” says Lancelot. “How else could he fight the Saxons?”

“You talk as if you want the monster back,” Arthur says. 

He really should have seen the punch coming.

Stars burst across Arthur’s vision, and he staggers into a tree. “You’re lucky there’s no one around,” he says when he’s gotten over his shock. “I’d have to have you executed otherwise.” 

Lancelot laughs in disbelief. “You are unbelievable, Arthur.” He starts to walk away.

“Wait!” calls Arthur. “Lancelot, stop. I order you to stop.”

Lancelot keeps walking. Arthur deliberates for a second before racing up to catch him. “Lancelot, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“Which part?” says Lancelot. “The part where you threatened to execute me, or the part where you called a man who sacrificed everything for you a monster?” 

“That’s not what I meant,” Arthur protests weakly. “You don’t know what he might be like with his magic back.”

“It’s harming him!” says Lancelot, swinging around. “Can’t you see that? He can’t heal without his magic. This is your last chance, Arthur. God knows you don’t deserve it, but there it is. Remove Merlin’s chains and accept him as he is, or admit that you are no better than your father.”


	26. Where We Need to Go

They take two horses, Arthur on one and Lancelot and Merlin on the other. Merlin doesn’t pay much attention as they gallop through the forest. They haven’t told him what they’re doing out of camp, and Merlin hasn’t asked. He doesn’t much care. When they finally draw to a stop, Merlin watches with disinterest as Arthur and Lancelot dismount.

“Come on, Merlin,” says Lancelot. He isn’t nervous… well, maybe a little nervous. But he trusts Merlin’s heart, and he has to believe that it is the same heart he remembers. 

Merlin climbs off the horse and stands still. He’s waiting for them to begin.

“We have decided to remove the cold iron,” Arthur says to Merlin. “We must have your word that you will not attack the Camelot camp.”

Merlin looks down at the shackles on his wrists. They glint an evil gray in the early morning light. As always, it is impossible to see what Merlin is thinking. Instead, Lancelot watches Arthur. There’s a naked desperation on it that makes Lancelot’s heart hurt.

“Merlin?” Arthur says. Lancelot can tell that he is being careful not to move any closer. “Is that what you want?”

The monster is thinking. He can hear the Merlin-shard somewhere far away, getting louder again. The Merlin-shard doesn’t understand what the monster has done with magic. The shard thinks that magic will fix everything. It doesn’t know any better.

But it’s also true that the monster cannot do anything in his present form. Pain prevents him from wielding a sword and circumstance prevents him from peace. At last, he gives a nod, and Lancelot steps forward with the key. The monster hadn’t been sure what to expect when Lancelot undid the shackles, whether he would feel its absence immediately or if both would have to go.

One was enough. Like blood rushing back into a numb limb, magic surges through the monster’s body. He falls to his knees, palms hitting the forest floor. How had he forgotten what the world was with magic? His senses are heightened; he can make out individual threads in Arthur’s coat, can hear Lancelot’s heartbeat. 

There are so many new sources of information. He is keenly aware of his own muscles and bones and guts and blood vessels; he could make a map of his own insides if he wanted to.

“Merlin?” says Lancelot. The monster doesn’t correct him. “What’s wrong?”

“I forgot what it’s like,” the monster says, slowly rising to his feet. There is wonder in his voice. It was not just the cold iron that prevented him from magic; Myfanwy had controlled Merlin’s perceptions with an iron will, often not allowing him to pay attention to anything but her. Now he is allowed to look wherever he likes and feel whatever he wants. 

Struck by inspiration, he yanks off his boots and steps with bare feet onto the forest floor. An underground spring three meters down tickles the soles of his feet. It’s not enough, he wants more, and he does a quick kinetic spell, warming the entire clearing. He closes his eyes and smiles to himself. He has never felt this happy before.

“How is he doing this?” Arthur says. “Two shackles are only a precaution; one should work fine.”

“No,” the monster says when Lancelot reaches for the other wrist. “I don’t want any more magic.” 

Lancelot drops his hands, his face creased. “Why not?”

“Because then I wouldn’t be able to die.” 

“Let him keep it on,” Arthur says roughly when Lancelot doesn’t move. “If that’s what he wants, he should have the right to be killed in battle like any other man.” 

The monster feels a rush of relief that Arthur understands him. Lancelot doesn’t look happy, but he nods and puts away the key. “Now what?” he asks. “Merlin?”

Rubbing the remaining shackle, the monster ponders the question. He has the strangest feeling that he is supposed to go somewhere, but he can’t remember anything else. As he thinks, Arthur and Lancelot watch him. 

“No one explained it to me,” the monster says in frustration. “She only talks to Merlin.”

“ _Who_ only talks to Merlin?” says Lancelot. 

“I don’t know!” the monster cries. “I don’t know, I don’t know!” The ground heaves beneath their feet. The trees rattle as scores of birds take wing. 

For the first time, Lancelot lets himself wonder if it might have been a mistake to give magic back to a recently rescued, extremely traumatized, recently-released prisoner. But if he lets Arthur know his doubts, it will be over for Merlin, and Lancelot refuses to accept that.

Lancelot takes one lurching step towards Merlin, then another, as the ground ripples beneath his feet. The closer he gets to Merlin, the harder it is to keep going, as if he and Merlin are the same poles of two different magnets. About a meter away from Merlin, Lancelot slides to the right or left every time he tries to go forward. 

“Merlin,” Lancelot says, “you have to stop. You’re going to bring down the forest.”

Arthur’s draws his sword, the metal rasping against the scabbard. The sound is like an off-switch. The ground shops shaking so abruptly that Lancelot and Arthur fall to their knees. Merlin is staring at Arthur’s sword.

“It’s all right,” he says. “I know where we need to go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think when I'm done with this whole story, I'm going to edit it and upload it as a separate work (leaving this version up, too). This whole thing is very first draft-y, and I want to turn it into a stronger, more cohesive story. I would lengthen all of the scenes and add extra stuff and remove what I don't like. The version I'm uploading right now is probably going to end at about 35k, and my goal for the finished version is more like 50k.


	27. Obviously Magic

Merlin calls them a dragon.

Of course he does, Arthur thinks numbly. Of course he has a pet dragon. Its massive green scales glimmer in the sunlight. It’s familiar, and Arthur realizes, with a sinking feeling, exactly where he’s seen it before. It acts nothing like then, however. No roars or fireballs; just its forehead pressed to Merlin’s. Both their eyes are closed.

“What are _doing_?” Arthur demands. Lancelot raises his brows.

“I think they are talking.”

“You mean…he’s talking with that _thing_?”

Merlin looks back at them, his eyes reproachful. Arthur immediately feels guilty. Then he feels a little nervous as the dragon eyes him. 

“I wouldn’t offend the giant, flying, fire-breathing lizard if I were you,” Lancelot says cheerfully. 

“Thanks,” says Arthur. “That’s ever so helpful. Really, Lancelot, what would I do without you?” One side of Merlin’s mouth quirks upward, and Arthur’s heart stutters. But the smile is lost almost as soon as it is begun. In one quick, efficient movement, Merlin swings himself onto the dragon’s back. He looks at them expectantly.

Arthur takes a step back. Lancelot is halfway to the dragon when he realizes that Arthur isn’t following.

“Arthur?” he says. Arthur swallows thickly.

“Humans are not meant to fly,” he says. For a moment, Lancelot looks confused. Then he laughs.

“You cannot tell me that you, Arthur Pendragon, King of Camelot, are afraid?”

A king is not afraid, but in this particular instance, perhaps a king may be apprehensive. Arthur is used to having both feet on the ground, or at least not too far away. Merlin looks at him with raised eyebrows.

“Oh, shut up,” says Arthur. It feels almost like old times. Then Lancelot clears his throat.

“Arthur? Are you getting on?”

“All right, all right,” says Arthur, stalking up to the dragon. Its scales are surprisingly easy to grip, and Arthur mounts the dragon without a problem. He finds himself wishing that he had beaten Lancelot to the position behind Merlin, but he does his best to banish this thought. This person may look like Merlin, maybe even act like Merlin, but he is, for all intents and purposes, a stranger. Until Arthur can remember that, he should keep his distance.

The dragon spreads its wings, and they lurch terrifyingly off the ground. Arthur gives a shout of surprise. For a horrible moment, he thinks he’s going to slide right off its back, but once it’s over the trees, it rights itself. Merlin’s shoulders are shaking, and Arthur leans around Lancelot in concern, but to his shock, Merlin is _laughing_. The dragon roars, spilling fire into the air. Then, with a deep flap of its wings, it begins to ascend even higher. Still not used to this kind of movement, Arthur clings to Lancelot. If anyone brings this up, he thinks darkly, he will have them executed.

Then he looks down. The shock almost knocks him right off the dragon. He can see the forest far below, its tree tops, its rivers. In the distance, he can make out a smudge he thinks is Camelot. It is all so impossibly small. Arthur spends the rest of the ride trying not to be sick.

They land on the shore of a brilliant blue lake. It is dappled with sunlight, and Arthur has to shade his eyes to look across it. He can only just make out the other shore. When the riders dismount, the dragon sits back, tucking in its wings. It keeps its eye on Merlin, and Arthur understands the sentiment. He, too, does not want to look away for one second. 

Merlin is looking neither at the dragon nor Arthur. His eyes are focused on the lake, his eyebrows drawn together. Lancelot and Arthur follow his gaze, but they see nothing but the water. 

“Merlin?” Lancelot says gently. 

Merlin ignores him and bends down at the water’s edge. He drags his fingers through the water, creating tiny ripples. His mouth is moving, but if he’s saying anything, it’s too quiet for Arthur to hear.

“Is he…is he doing magic?” says Arthur. Lancelot shrugs helplessly.

“I think we’ll have to wait and see.”

The dragon settles its head on one of its enormous arms and sighs. A ripple of hot air passes over them, and Arthur looks warily at the dragon. It looks back with cold and glittering eyes. 

“Arthur,” Lancelot says in a strained voice. When Arthur looks around, his eyes widen. There, in the middle of the lake, is a hand. In the hand is a sword. It is the most beautiful sword Arthur has ever seen. It shines golden in the sunlight, so bright that it seems to produce its own light. 

“How,” Arthur starts, but then he stops, because the answer is obviously _magic_. Merlin holds out his hand, and the sword arcs through the air, the hilt hitting his palm with a satisfying thwack. The hand in the lake sinks back into the water.

Arthur and Lancelot are silent as they watch Merlin with his sword. He examines the blade, going so far as to drag his finger over the sharp edge. A line of blood drips off the sword onto the grassy riverbank. Then he tests the balance, swinging it to and fro, his brow furrowed. When he is satisfied, he goes to sheathe it—but there is no sheath. Merlin is not dressed like a knight; he is not even dressed like a servant. His clothes are ragged, his boots falling to pieces. Arthur feels a stab of shame. 

“We can get you whatever you need at the camp,” Arthur says.

Merlin looks at him, his face distressingly blank. Then Arthur notices that Merlin’s lower lip is trembling. Arthur wants to touch Merlin. He wants to hold him and tell him that everything will be all right, that there is nothing to be afraid of, that he loves him beyond words.

Lancelot steps between them. “Merlin, what’s special about this sword?”

Merlin blinks, his gaze refocusing on Lancelot as if he is coming out of a daze. “It’s mine,” he says, as if that should explain everything. 

And maybe it does.

***

Vortigern is doomed.

Perhaps you have forgotten about Vortigern, the cruel leader of the Saxons. I do not blame you, as I have chosen not to dwell on him. He is an angry man from a line of angry men; he is unremarkable. The most interesting thing about him is his curse.

One day, the earth will swallow him whole.

That’s what the sorcerers tell him, the witches, the dryads, the imps and the elves, anything and everything with the power of Sight. And they tell him one thing more: the solution is in Camelot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you everyone for your comments!! They really motivate me to keep going. I haven't had time to answer them yet, but I read every single one.


	28. Try Again

It has been almost six years since the monster picked up a sword, and Lancelot offers to spar with him. The monster almost says no—he wants to be alone—but he could use the practice. They go to a clearing and draw their swords. 

“Don’t worry, my friend,” said Lancelot. “I’ll go easy on you.” There’s a teasing smile on his face, and the monster is taken aback. Doesn’t Lancelot know that the monster is not to be trusted? But it seems Lancelot doesn’t know that. He clashes swords with Merlin. 

The first time they fight, Lancelot wins easily, knocking Merlin’s sword out of his hand within the first ten seconds. Merlin looks silently at the blade glimmering golden in the grass. Lancelot worries that Merlin is going to give up, but, of course, he doesn’t. That’s not Merlin’s style, and it never has been. Merlin takes the sword back up and swings it back and forth, contemplatory. Lancelot wonders what thoughts race behind Merlin’s still expression. He might ask, he supposes, but he doesn’t think that Merlin would answer. 

They spar again; Merlin lasts a little longer this time. Then they take a break, sitting next to each other on the sparse grass.

“I missed you,” Lancelot says without thinking. He stares down at his boots. He’s afraid to look at Merlin, to see his friend’s reaction. If they _are_ still friends. Lancelot is not entirely sure. They might not be, after all these years. Merlin might want new friends. Or he might not want any. It’s this thought that worries Lancelot the most. Merlin used have to have _so many friends_. Merlin all alone scarcely seems like Merlin. Lancelot hears Merlin sigh. It’s a small, exhausted sound. When Merlin speaks, his voice is almost too quiet for Lancelot to hear.

“I didn’t miss you.” 

“Oh,” says Lancelot.

“I didn’t miss anyone,” says Merlin. 

Lancelot glances over. Merlin is plucking blades of grass and then burning them them to cinders with his magic. It’s a little transfixing to watch. 

“Tomorrow,” Merlin says, and stops. Lancelot waits patiently. Merlin looks so small, so frail, and Lancelot wants to put his arm around him, but he thinks it would probably do more harm than good. “I have to be ready by tomorrow, and I still don’t…”

“You don’t…”

Merlin shakes his head. His eyes glitter with unshed tears. “I don’t know who I’m supposed to fight. I don’t know, I don’t know what I’m doing, I don’t know what I’m doing.” His voice shakes.

Jesu. Lancelot wants to hug Merlin so badly, and he knows he shouldn’t, but it’s hard. He braces his hands on his knees instead. “Merlin,” he says softly. “You don’t have to fight if you don’t want to you. It’s your choice.”

Merlin’s face crumples, and Lancelot inwardly curses. What has he said? 

“There are no choices,” Merlin says, his voice strangled. Lancelot’s throat aches in sympathy. “Do you think it’s true that if I don’t fight, more people will die?”

“I don’t know,” Lancelot says honestly. “I—probably. I think you have the power to end the attack on Camelot before it begins.”

“But I have to kill to save lives,” says Merlin. He holds the sword into the light, and Lancelot swears the metal shivers. “I can sense them. The Saxon camp. The citadel. I can feel all of it. It’s like it’s all happening inside me…” His voice drifts into silence. Merlin shifts, and Lancelot thinks that he’s going to stand, but instead Merlin says, “It was all for her.”

“What was all for her?” says Lancelot. He doesn’t have to as who the _her_ is. 

Merlin shakes his head, his dark hair flopping. “It was all for her,” he repeats, holding up a hand. Golden sparks dance over his palm.

“Oh,” says Lancelot. “Your magic.”

“My magic,” Merlin agrees. “All for her. What is my magic without her?”

Lancelot bites the inside of his cheek, sorting through what he wants to say. “Merlin,” he says at last. “Your magic wasn’t _for_ her. That’s ridiculous. You were the one born with your magic; your magic is for you, not for anyone else.” 

“I was born to be servant,” Merlin says dully. “That’s all I am, Lancelot.”

It takes Lancelot a moment to realize that Merlin has addressed him by name. His eyes prickle, and he looks up at the darkening blue sky. “No one is born to serve anyone else,” Lancelot says at last. “You are for yourself, and no one else. Your magic. Your…your body. They’re not for anyone but you. Yes, you should help people. Yes, you should use your talents for good. But no one is made to be a servant.”

Merlin rises, his sword held loosely in one hand. “Let’s try again,” he says, his voice flat. They do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone! Sorry for the brevity of the chapter, my spring break is soon and I should be able to get lots of fic writing done then. Thank you to everyone who's still reading!!
> 
> One other note: I finally made a tumblr for my fic! fictionista654 dot tumblr dot com. It's 100% empty right now, but I'm aiming to change that, hahaha. So if you want to chat about Merlin or anything else, come visit! And if you send me a prompt, I might even write it :)


	29. For Camelot

Ice crystals glitter like mist in the early light; white frost clings to the forest floor. It is beautiful, and it is dreadful. Arthur holds out his hand and watches snow settle on his palm. Unlike normal snow, it doesn’t melt on contact with Arthur’s hot skin. Each snowflake, composed of gossamer-thin lattices, retains its individual shape. 

“Is Merlin doing this?” Arthur says to Lancelot. They have ridden their horses to the peak of the rise which overlooks the Saxon camp and are surveying the hive of warriors.

“I don’t know,” says Lancelot. He looks over his shoulder at Merlin, who is sitting on his own horse, a vague expression on his face. The magic sword hangs from his sword-belt, its scabbard deceptively plain. 

“Should one of us speak with him?” says Arthur. “I was sort of under the impression that he wanted to lead us into battle.” 

A layer of snow has settled on Lancelot’s hair and beard and mantle. His brown eyes glisten beneath his brow. “You can never tell with him.” 

“Do you hear that?” Arthur says to Merlin. “You’re unpredictable.”

Merlin swings himself out of his saddle, landing softly in a crouch. He rises and draws his sword. The golden-hued blade seems to flow like liquid. Merlin walks steadily through the snowdrifts, and Arthur and Lancelot follow as Merlin cuts diagonally down the small mountain. Between one step and the next, Merlin rises into the air, wind rustling his hair. Arthur and Lancelot look up in awe as Merlin hovers above them. 

“I didn’t know he could do that,” says Arthur. 

On her turret, Morgana watches Merlin as he plunges upward and comes to one hundred feet above the Saxon camp. He’s just as high up as Morgana is, though too far away for Morgana to make out anything but his outline and the glint of a yellow blade. She knows it’s him, though. Who else would have that much power? 

Gwen is overseeing the Great Hall-turned-infirmary when a servant flags her down. “Your majesty,” says the girl, her blond hair a wispy mess. “There’s something happening outside the walls.” Gwen hurries to the window and gazes through the strangely clear air—wasn’t it just snowing?—at a dark shape hanging in the sky. She frowns, trying to make it make sense.

“That’s a person,” she says. The maid nods.

“I think so, your majesty.” 

In the sky, Merlin watches the world below him. He can see Camelot’s soldiers seeded throughout the trees, he can look down at the warren that is the Saxon camp and watch them watch him. He holds his sword loosely in one hand. He is listening intently.

Down in the earth, a voice calls out to him. He rotates slowly and looks at the citadel. He can feel the pinpricks of life within its stone walls as well as see them. They shine gold, like Excalibur. One light burns brighter than all the rest, and Merlin knows that Morgana is here. He can’t believe that he can remember her, but he does, and her face materializes behind his eyes.

He knew Morgana well, once. He knew Morgana, and something happened, and he doesn’t know her anymore. He racks his mind trying to uncover the answer, but scar tissue covers many of his most painful memories. And when he was with Myfanwy, she spent so much time scrambling his head that he hardly knows which memories are real and which are not.

Myfanwy. Merlin’s heart aches. Their severed connection aches like a phantom limb. Her voice, faint though it is, climbs up from unimaginable depths.

_You put me here, Merlin. Come get me._

Merlin tries to wrench back his concentration, but Myfanwy’s voice has teeth. _Come get me, my monster. I miss you so much._

On the ground, Arthur and Lancelot watch Merlin spin like a top in the air. “What the hell is he doing?” demands Arthur.

Lancelot shakes his head. “He looks like a dog trying to chase its own tail.” 

“Something’s wrong,” says Arthur, shaking with adrenaline. He has an image of Merlin turning on them, cutting down everyone with his golden sword. Then he remembers Merlin asking to keep the second shackle of cold iron. _So he can die._

Arthur is a coiled spring, and he can’t take it any longer. “For Camelot!” he roars, unsheathing his sword and raising it above his head. The knights of Camelot thunder down the mountain and fall upon the Saxon camp.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess who's under quarantine? Yep, I'm having the time of my life. The good news is that I have a ton of free time in my future to work on this and other projects. I hope everyone is safe and healthy!


	30. Inside the Pit

We began the story in the middle, on a battlefield. On a battlefield, we will begin the end. 

Arthur clings to his reins with his left hand as he punches his sword into the air with his right. He feels like he can break open the sky. 

Merlin is up there right now, above the rushing armies and clashing metal. He’s above Arthur and Lancelot and Vortigern and Morgana and Gwen. His power lights him up. His skin glows with it; his eyes gleam golden. The air around him sizzles with energy. He could destroy the citadel that used to be his home. He could do anything.

The voice beneath the earth gets louder. 

_Come get me, Merlin, please come get me, my love my love my love…_ The voice trails off and the ground shudders. Mounted soldiers fly head-first off their horses. The castle shivers, and a pulse of magic from the citadel catches Merlin in its blast. Someone is holding together the very stones of Camelot. 

Morgana. The woman he killed. He remembers this piece of information suddenly: the heavy glass bottle, the bitter smell, the way she pushed against the embrace of her killer.

He’d done that without Myfanwy. He’d done that on his own. And for what? For Arthur Pendragon? A man whose very presence had forced Merlin to hide himself for years and years and years? A man who hit Merlin, starved him, treated him one day like a friend and the next like something scraped from the bottom of his boot— 

_Destroy him,_ screams Myfanwy. The ground buckles with a muted boom, and a rift splits the Saxon camp in two. Tents, horses, and people fall into the widening gap in the ground. Another thud of noise, and the rift spreads into the forest. Trees groan and buckle, their roots slipping from the earth.

Heat billows from the cracks in the ground, and Merlin knows it’s about to get much worse. He grabs onto the soldiers with his mind, shoving them away from the opening. 

Arthur is one of the soldiers caught in Merlin’s grasp, and for a moment, he has no idea what’s happening. His horse’s hooves carve rivets in the ground as some unknown force pulls them backwards. He has the sense that the ground is shaking, that something his happening, but he can scarcely see through the carnage.

From her tower-top, Morgana has a better view. Not that she’s looking. Her eyes squeezed shut from strain, sweat glittering like a crown on her brow and soaking her hair, she clutches the parapet. As the ground shakes and the world splits open, Morgana focuses on keeping the citadel in one piece. It is an island of calm in the chaotic ocean surrounding it, but Morgana doesn’t know how long she can hold on.

A hand rests on Morgana’s shoulder, another on her waist. “You’re doing beautifully,” Gwen whispers. 

Morgana shakes her head, tears spilling down her cheeks. “I can’t hold on. I can’t.”

“You can,” Gwen says firmly. “You will.” The wind whirls around them, tangling their hair. Gwen has never wished so badly for magic. She would do anything to lessen Morgana’s burden. But all she can do is hold on tight, keeping Morgana together as Morgana keeps Camelot together.

On the ground, Arthur looks upward. Merlin is impossibly high, impossibly small. He cannot make out any of Merlin’s features, can barely tell which direction Merlin is facing. What if this is the last time Arthur ever sees him? What if Arthur dies, and Merlin never knows? “I’m sorry,” Arthur says, though he can barely hear his own voice over the clamor of war and the splitting earth. “I’m so, so sorry.” 

In the sky, Merlin hears Arthur’s voice as if it is in his ear. Something loosens inside him; a tumbler slides into place. Out of it all, out of the pain and the terror and the anger and the horror, Merlin feels a shadow of what he used to feel for Arthur. Images flash through his mind:

Arthur lounging on his horse, reins held loosely in one hand, looking back at Merlin with fondness. Arthur in bed in the morning, the light dappling over his broad chest, his mouth open against the pillow as he sleeps. Arthur in the woods, his lips pressed to Merlin’s. 

Merlin’s love, locked away for so long, suddenly rushes back into place.

Is this good? Is this bad? Should Merlin love the man who hurt him? Forgive him? 

_But it’s mine,_ Merlin thinks. _This love is_ mine. _It came from inside me. I built it. I harbored it. I kept it safe all this time. She can’t have it back. She can’t._

Smoke rises from the rift—the pit, really—rolling over the battlefield. Merlin grasps the soldiers once more and holds them in place, keeping them from going over the edge. 

Inside the pit, something is stirring. A behemoth, it slithers through the smoke. Merlin cannot make out its features, just its enormity. A dark shape larger than any creature he has ever seen. Fear clamps down on Merlin. He begins to shake. Blood rushes in his ears and dark spots fill his vision.

He knows what’s coming from the pit. He knows it very well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: I have a zoom class on in the background! #notpayingattention #getmeoutofhere


	31. Heart Full of Blood

Once upon a time, a little girl rose from the ashes. 

No, that’s not the beginning.

This is: Once upon a time, a little boy hit his head on a rock and drowned. Luckily for him, his mother was a great sorcerer. Using her own life-force, she forged him a new heart. It was cold as stone and red as a ruby, and the when the boy woke up with it freezing in his chest, he knew he would never be warm again. 

The little boy grew up and married his childhood sweetheart, and they had a daughter with lovely red hair and green eyes and heart full of blood. And when the king murdered the little boy’s daughter, he took her in his arms and gave her his own heart. 

The little boy died before he could put his heart in her chest himself. And when the daughter held her new heart in her hand, she knew she would never put it away. It was a dangerous world for a sorcerer-girl, and she needed all the help she could get.

But our hearts are not meant to be on the outside. The longer the daughter wore her heart on a chain, the emptier she grew. She committed unspeakable acts. But the magic was forged to save a child, and it refused to take a child’s life.

Once upon a time, a king killed a warlock. Luckily for the warlock, he died in the presence of the little boy’s spell. 

For years, the heart had been searching for a suitable home. Not just anyone could claim a magic heart. The host needed to have magic of the extraordinary kind. When the warlock died, the spell cracked in two. One half embedded itself in Merlin chest, where it sank deeper and deeper each day. 

The other half stayed with Myfanwy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I thought it would be helpful if I gave you all my chapter summaries from my doc if you want a refresher. 
> 
> Prologue  
> battlefield
> 
> Chapter 1  
> meeting arthur, lance, and gwen  
> myfanwy making merlin kill a villager
> 
> Chapter 2  
> witch in the woods  
> merlin sexual assault
> 
> Chapter 3  
> villagers tell arthur about monster  
> Merlin wakes up alone in myfanwy’s chambers  
> morgana enters camelot in disguise 
> 
> Chapter 4  
> morgana and gwen lesbian origin story  
> agravaine meets emrys
> 
> Chapter 5  
> arthur memory up until kiss  
> gwen’s pillowslip is missing, she tells arthur that he needs to get over merlin
> 
> Chapter 6  
> myfanwy sends merlin to kill villagers, meet vortigern  
> morgana prays in inn
> 
> Chapter 7  
> porcelain villagers  
> gwen employs morgana  
> myfanwy yells at may, yells at merlin for keeping children alive
> 
> Chapter 8  
> arthur remembers killing merlin  
> gwen argues with lancelot, bonds with maude over lesbianism 
> 
> Chapter 9  
> elyan and gwaine taken  
> meet monster 
> 
> Chapter 10  
> vortigern cursed   
> army on the move  
> lancelot says he had a friend who was a sorcerer and that they need sorcerers in the army
> 
> Chapter 11  
> elyan’s cell
> 
> Chapter 12  
> interlude up until myfanwy’s "heart turns over" (whoops)
> 
> Chapter 13  
> gwen has a cold  
> gwaine surprises arthur and knights
> 
> Chapter 14  
> gwaine challenges lancelot to a duel 
> 
> Chapter 15  
> lancelot and gwaine duel  
> merlin rearranges army  
> morgana dreams about elaine taking the heart from her father
> 
> Chapter 16  
> battle begins, arthur sees merlin
> 
> Chapter 17  
> arthur kills merlin, myfanwy bursts into flame, merlin lives again
> 
> Chapter 18  
> merlin in pain, cold iron
> 
> Chapter 19  
> arthur understands “magic corrupts”, lancelot tells him that merlin’s terrified of him
> 
> Chapter 20  
> maude tells gwen to open the gates  
> Gwaine and merlin in dreamspace 
> 
> Chapter 21  
> arthur and lancelot bromance convo, “just talk to him”  
> merlin unhappy  
> morgana reveal
> 
> Chapter 22  
> first conversation merlin and arthur, merlin chills with freya  
> morgwen sex scene  
> merlin shard terrified  
> morgana climbs battlements 
> 
> Chapter 23  
> merlin trauma response
> 
> Chapter 24  
> morgana’s tempest  
> merlin tells arthur that merlin wasn’t afraid of him  
> lancelot mad at arthur
> 
> Chapter 25  
> merlin knows where he needs to go
> 
> Chapter 26  
> dragon time, excalibur  
> vortigern is doomed
> 
> Chapter 27  
> lancelot and merlin spar 
> 
> Chapter 28  
> merlin freezes air, flies  
> myfanwy calls to merlin  
> arthur attacks
> 
> Chapter 29  
> merlin remembers killing morgana, love  
> morgwen power couple  
> merlin knows what’s coming
> 
> Chapter 30  
> myfanwy origin story


	32. A Matter of Perspective

The shape that erupts out of the pit blots out the sun. It soars above Merlin, leathery red wings beating the air. The resulting wind sends Merlin pinwheeling head-over-heels through the air. By the time he can right himself, his stomach is roiling. Bile fills his mouth, and he spits, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. The dragon hovers before him, its fiery eyes boring into his soul.

It is twice as a large as Kilgharra; its sharp white fangs curl over its closed lips. The differences don’t stop there: this dragon is not scaled, but faceted like a diamond. Like a ruby. An ordinary sword would break against its hide.

Excalibur is no ordinary sword.

But a sword is only as strong as the one who wields it, and Merlin can barely hold it aloft. His heart thuds.

_You won’t hurt me,_ says the dragon. It is a command, given as easily as the hundreds of thousands of commands that have come before. Merlin’s teeth chatter. He dimly hears the clattering over the wind and the whining sound that has filled his head.

_Look at them,_ the dragon says. _So tiny. So insignificant._

Despite himself, Merlin looks down. She’s right. From up here, he can’t tell Arthur’s army from Vortigern’s. They’re all one mass of humanity. 

_But they’re only tiny because we’re up here and they’re down there,_ Merlin thinks. _It’s just a matter of perspective._ He tries to speak, but his throat closes around the words. His breath slows to a trickle. He is naked under the dragon’s stare.

_My lovely monster,_ says the dragon. _I am here to save you. ___

__“S-save me f-from what?” says Merlin, his voice shaking. A pain cracks through his abdomen, slicing him apart. He has never been so cold, or hurt so much._ _

__The dragon snorts, twin puffs of smoke erupting from its nostrils. Merlin ascends a few feet to escape the blast of heat._ _

___Don’t you remember?_ says the dragon. It sounds disappointed. Merlin’s heart plummets. He doesn’t want the dragon to be upset with him. He wants to be loved. _ _

__“Remember what?” says Merlin. Instead of responding with words, the dragon sends an image into his head. The pain comes back, and Merlin doubles over, clutching his stomach. Again and again, he feels Arthur’s sword rip into him._ _

___Thanks for nothing, sire.__ _

__“NO!” says Merlin, flying backwards. Tears roll down his cheeks and are caught by the wind. “Stop, please.”_ _

__The dragon follows, relentless. Arthur kisses him, Arthur kills him. Kiss, kill, kiss, kill. Merlin shakes his head, trying to dislodge the pictures. Arthur had not even looked like himself, he had been so scared—_ _

__But that isn’t right._ _

___Scared?_ thinks Merlin. _Why would Arthur be scared?_

Arthur’s hands moving as if against his will.

“You did it,” breaths Merlin. “You killed me.” 

At once, the images retract, the dragon looking as contrite as it is possible for a dragon to look. _He had already hurt you so many times._

Hurt. 

The word conjures a bed and fingernails raking down his back. Hands all over him. Villages on fire. The taste and smell of his own blood. A mask sealed to his skin with sweat and tears. 

_Come back to me, Merlin,_ whispers the dragon. The ruby set between its eyes pulses with an unholy light. It calls to Merlin like Ithaca to Odysseus, Canaan to Moses. Merlin knows that he is meant to fly with this dragon. Slowly, he drifts towards the beast.

_That’s it, my love,_ says the dragon. _You’re so close._

No. This isn’t right. Merlin tries to drag himself back, but the dragon’s will closes around him. Inside Merlin, a struggle erupts. 

_She is the only person who will ever love us,_ says the monster. _She saved us from Arthur._

_She stole us,_ Merlin retorts. _She stole us and hurt us._

_For our own good,_ pleads the monster. 

It seems that she will win. How could Merlin resist her all-encompassing love? How could he resist his place by her side? She needs him, she loves him, she’ll have him. Merlin’s magic, while powerful, is hampered by the second cold iron shackle. He can barely sense it, let alone use it.

But here’s the thing. Merlin’s not just a warlock.

He’s also a Dragonlord.


	33. The Names of Human Beings

Words are subtle creatures. Each one is loaded with associations, a whole package of information imparted just a few syllables. No two are made the same. Revenge, for example, is not the same word as vengeance. Words are names, and names are important.

How much more so are the names of human beings? 

The monster looks at the dragon.

Merlin looks at Myfanwy.

Myfanwy took his body, his mind, his autonomy, his life. She stripped him of his identity and fashioned a new one. She replaced _Merlin_ with _monster_. 

And those are not the same thing at all.

With a roar, Merlin swings Excalibur upward, nearly slicing into Myfanwy’s jaw. He’s a second too late, her powerful wings beating the air. Undeterred, Merlin shoots upward to meet her. “Drakon!” he cries. “Nun de gei s’eikein kai emois epe’essin hepesthai!” 

His command halts Myfanwy. She hovers in place, straining to get free. But Merlin won’t let her. He flies until their eyes are level. “I’m not—I’m not a monster,” whispers Merlin. His throat is suddenly too tight to talk properly. He can barely breathe. “I’m not a monster.” 

_Not_ a _monster_. My _monster_ , says Myfanwy. Merlin feels like her eyes are going right through him. 

“I’m not _yours_ ,” says Merlin. “I belong to myself. I belong to m-myself.” His voice falters when Myfanwy’s mind slams into him. Physically, she can’t move, but he hasn’t bound her mind. Her commands fill him to the brim, and he begins to slacken his control over her. He can’t remember why he wanted to hurt her. She’s the only person who loves him, who’s ever loved him—

 _No,_ thinks Merlin. _No!_ But the monster rushes back in like the tide, filling all the mental places Merlin had finally reclaimed. He’s a monster, he’s nothing, he’s worthless, he’s dirty. His grip slackens on Excalibur. It would be so easy to let go, to return to Myfanwy’s protection. To Myfanwy’s love.

When Myfanwy first took him, he was near death. It was the only way she was able to get past his defenses. And once she was in, Merlin could never throw her out.

But now. But now. 

_No one is made to be a servant._

The words blaze through Merlin’s consciousness, and the iron shackle on his left wrist snaps in two. His full power roars through him, so fast and so powerfully that he can do nothing but let go. Golden light streams from his eyes, his skin, his whole being. To the soldiers on the ground and the citizens in Camelot, he looks like a second sun.

Merlin isn’t a sun, of course. 

He’s much more powerful.

Myfanwy roars, flame erupting from her maw. It envelops Merlin, burns so hot they can feel it on the ground. And then it passes, leaving Merlin unhurt.

“I’ll give you a choice,” he tells Myfanwy, his voice clear and strong. “Leave this place, or I will kill you.”

 _You can’t make me,_ Myfanwy says. _That isn’t how this works._

Merlin lip curls back, revealing a sharp canine. “Not anymore,” he says. “And know this, Myfanwy. If I hear that you are sowing trouble, I will hunt you down, and I will kill you. Painfully.” He releases his hold on her, and for a moment, man and dragon eye each other.

Then, with an unearthly howl, Myfanwy lunges at Merlin. He rushes to meet her, Excalibur upraised. Excalibur, forged in a dragon’s flame. Excalibur, made for Arthur Pendragon. Excalibur, finally Merlin’s. It pierces the soft flesh of Myfanwy’s belly, sinking in to the hilt. Bracing his feet against Myfanwy’s body, Merlin yanks the sword out, and burning blood falls over him like rain.

The sound Myfanwy makes would chill a demon. It sounds like grief, and anger, and hideousness. It sounds like a child, burning. It sounds like an ending. Myfanwy plunges like a stone, down, down, back into the pit from whence she came. Merlin raises his hands, about to press the earth back together, when a small shape on the Saxon side darts forward and shoves another.

Vortigern pinwheels wildly, his arms scrabbling for something that isn’t there. The last thing he sees before falling over the edge is Maida, her eyes hard and bright, her teeth bared. 

(Do you remember Maida? Neither did Vortigern. Until it was too late.) 

The land groans as Merlin mends it; the land shakes and shudders. The pit turns into a rift turns into a seam. When he is done, it is as if the earth never opened at all. With a soft sigh, Merlin lets go of his magic.

And plummets from the sky.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't decide if I want to work on editing this story or writing a sequel once I'm done. Or if I want to work on one of my million other fics. I guess I have time for everything these days... (Low key pretending that school doesn't exist anymore.)


	34. Awake

The day after Merlin drops like a shot bird from the sky, he wakes with an ache in his head and a back on fire. He tries to groan, but his throat, sticky and dry, produces only a croak. Something cool dribbled over his lips and tongue, dulling the sharp pain. 

“There you go,” says a gentle voice, and Merlin’s lashes flutter open. The light shining in his eyes makes him whimper and shy away. There is the swish of curtains closing, and the light dims. Green and purple dots swim in Merlin’s vision.

“More water?” says the voice. Merlin’s vision is resolving, and he can make out slices of the voice’s face. Proud nose. Strong jaw. Soft pink lips and sharp teeth. A strong hand cups Merlin’s cheek, bleeding warmth. 

With Arthur’s help, Merlin sits up enough to sip—then gulp—the water. 

“You’re getting good at this,” Arthur says. “The water-drinking thing. It was touch and go for a moment, there.”

Merlin looks over Arthur’s shoulder at the door. It’s closed. He yanks it open with his mind, so hard that the doorknob bounces off the wall. Arthur startles at the sound.

“Sorry,” he says when he follows Merlin’s gaze. “I thought it would help you sleep. They’re being noisy in the infirmary.”

The infirmary. Merlin looks around. He and Arthur are in his old room in Gaius’s chambers.

Arthur notices this glance and hopes Merlin doesn’t think being put in this old room is a slight. “You can have a guest chamber, of course,” Arthur says hastily. “But Guinevere thought it would be best for you to be somewhere familiar. Somewhere that was yours.” 

What really happened was that Arthur had wanted to put Merlin in Arthur’s bed, and Gwen had rightly pointed out that Merlin would probably prefer not to wake up in somebody else’s bed.

“Guinevere,” Merlin repeats. 

“Do you want to see her?”

 _Do I want to see her?_ wonders Merlin. He doesn’t know if she’ll recognize him. 

Arthur picks over his next words. “Is it all right if I stay? I can get someone else to watch over you, now that you’re awake.” He doesn’t know what to say, how to say it. He’s terrified that Merlin will tell him to leave. He’s terrified that Merlin will beg him to stay.

Merlin doesn’t do either of these things. He lies back down and wraps his arms around himself. He shivers savagely, his teeth clattering behind tightly closed lips.

“Merlin?” says Arthur, alarmed. “What is it?”

“It’s his fever, you idiot,” says Gaius. 

Arthur jumps off his chair and runs to Gaius’s side. “You’re here! In Camelot!” 

Gaius shrugs Arthur off and rushes to Merlin’s side. He has aged years since Merlin’s disappearance, and his hands shake when he touches Merlin’s face. “Merlin,” he says, his voice heartbroken. “What have they done to you?” 

Merlin begins to cry. His body hurts, his mind hurts, and it has been so long since he’s seen someone who’s only ever been good to him. 

Arthur watches from the doorway as Merlin and Gaius embrace. He feels out of place in this almost-familial reunion. _I have no family,_ he thinks, _not anymore._ Immediately, he reprimands himself for the selfish thought. It’s not as though Merlin is luckier than Arthur.

Downstairs, Gwaine soaks a hunk of dried bread in ale and gnaws on the softened results. He looks up when Arthur comes down the stairs.

“Your Majesty!” Gwaine calls out. “How was the patient?” 

Arthur looks at Gwaine without answering. He’s not sure what to say. He’s been watching Merlin swim in and out of consciousness for the past day, and despite countless reassurances from Lance that Merlin was too powerful to die, Arthur worried each time Merlin slipped away that it would be for good. Almost as bad was when Merlin cried in his sleep. Arthur felt so useless each time.

“He’s recovering,” Arthur says at last. “His skull un-caved.” He remembers the way Merlin looked when he first hit the ground and shudders. 

“That’s good,” says Gwaine. 

“ _You_ ’re doing a lot better,” says Arthur. 

“Think it has something to do with the man upstairs,” says Gwaine. “Merlin, I mean.”

Arthur is about to leave when a thought comes to him, and he turns around to stare at Gwaine. “Did you know about him? When he was a manservant?”

“I thought we all knew,” says Gwaine. “You always were a little thick.”

Arthur would deny it, but it’s true. He’s missed so much. 

Gwen and Morgana, for example. Arthur’d had no idea. Maybe if he had, he would have felt less alone. Maybe he would have kissed Merlin sooner. Maybe —

 _And there I go_ , Arthur thinks, _making everything about myself._ He’s depressed with his selfishness. He wants to be a good person, but he can’t see how to undo all the horrible things within.

He stops at a window and looks down over the courtyard, which is still a makeshift refugee camp. The Saxons, leaderless, still rest outside the gates as they recover. Arthur isn’t worried about them, not with Merlin around. He thinks Merlin could probably dispatch the Saxon host in his sleep. 

Not that he wants to use Merlin as a weapon. 

Not that he wants to use Merlin at all.

“I cannot be her,” he says out loud, his hands pressed against the wall. “I cannot be her.” 

“Arthur,” says Gwen. She’s at the end of the hallway, head high, crown glittering, utterly regal compared to Arthur’s disheveled appearance and hunched shoulders. He stands up straight when he sees her, though.

“Gwen,” he says cautiously. They have not spoken since he erupted at her to day before, asking how she could bring Morgana’s venom into the heart of Camelot. Gwen remained silent as Arthur yelled, looking cool and dispassionate in a manner that belied her scorn. Arthur had withered underneath that stare. “Are you going to Merlin?”

Gwen nods. “I missed him,” she says quietly. “He was my best friend, once.”

Arthur remembers those days. They had all been such children, then. 

“He’s awake,” Arthur tells her, and he is gratified to see Gwen smile. Taking her skirt in her hands, she hurries past Arthur and disappears around the corner.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So close to the end! Maybe 3 or 4 more chapters?


	35. If You Knew What I've Done

Once upon a time, Guinevere Pendragon had a friend. 

Is that where we start? Or is it like this:

Once upon a time, Guinevere was born. She was a charming little girl who loved the world, no matter what the world wrought. It took her mother and her infant sister, it sent her brother away. But it also made flowers bloom outside the smith, it brought her Morgana, and later Lancelot.

But the flowers withered, and Morgana left, and Lancelot was not enough. 

But Guinevere had a friend. 

And then she didn’t.

She stands outside Merlin’s door, her heart thumping wildly. She smooths her skirts and adjusts her braids and tries to look as soothing as possible.

She opens the door.

Guinevere had never been in Merlin’s room before, and she is struck by how dark it is. Its one window is small and faces north, where the light is dim. Perhaps that is better, for Merlin appears to be asleep. She approaches him with her breath caught inside her. 

It’s him. Of course it’s him. Gwen doesn’t know what she was expecting.

He looks older, of course. His face, even in sleep, is lightly lined. He’s too young for a face like this, Gwen thinks. His hair, while mostly black, glints with a handful of white strands. 

“Oh, Merlin,” she whispers, running her fingers through his hair. “What happened to you?”

Merlin jolts awake, his hands outstretched. Gwen scrambles backward, nearly knocking over her chair. “It’s me!” she says. “It’s just me, Merlin!” 

His hands lower. He looks at her. His mind is in disarray. The fortress he built to protect his inner self fell when Myfanwy did. There is too much happening in his brain, and it hurts, and Merlin hates it. It is like there are two people inside him: the man he was then, and the man he is now. Some of things from the man he was then are still trapped in the rubble, and excavation is slow work.

But he remembers Gwen. 

In a way, it’s better than seeing Arthur, because Myfanwy has not poisoned him against Gwen. Something loosens in his chest and silent tears roll down his cheeks.

“Merlin,” Gwen says again. “Merlin.” She reaches out her hand and leaves it in the air. After a moment, Merlin reaches out and grasps it. He squeezes so tightly that Gwen almost pulls away. But she bears the pain for Merlin.

“Are you real?”

“Of course I’m real,” says Gwen, her voice choked with her own tears. 

“I thought of you,” Merlin says, struggling to sit up. “I thought of you when I saw him.”

“Who?” says Gwen. “Arthur?”

Merlin shakes his head. “No. Not him. The knight. He’s got away. He’s traveling home.”

“You don’t mean…” says Gwen. “You don’t mean Elyan?” When he didn’t return with the army, she didn’t know if she would ever see her brother again. When Merlin nods, she sags with relief.

“How do you know?” she says. “How can you see him?”

Merlin lies back down and turns on his side, facing the wall. His response is so quiet that Gwen can barely hear it. “She taught me,” he says. “She taught me how to use my magic the right way.”

“She taught you how to kill,” Gwen says before she can think better of it. Her words seem to hang in the air.

“She never taught me that,” Merlin says at last. “I was a murderer long before I met her.”

“A murderer,” says Gwen. “Do you mean Morgana? Because that was _terrible_ decision to poison her, but it worked out, didn’t it?”

Merlin’s fingers curl around his blanket. His knuckles whiten. “I did that,” he says. “I poisoned her. I poisoned her.”

“No, no, Merlin,” says Gwen, starting to panic. “You didn’t know what else to do, she told me, it’s all right, you’re all right. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything.” Somehow, Guinevere Pendragon has been replaced by the old Gwen whose words always seemed to come wrong. 

Merlin’s face crumples. He looks so hopeless, so horribly hopeless, that Gwen begins to cry in earnest. Her tears drip from cheek to chin to collarbone. She is wracked with sobs, her whole body convulsing. 

“Don’t cry for me,” Merlin says. “I’m not worth it.”

Gwen wipes the tears from her face, her shoulders still shaking. “Don’t say that,” she says. “Why would you say that?”

Merlin’s lips curl. “If you knew what I have done, you would run from me.”

“No, I wouldn’t,” says Gwen. “I don’t care what you did or when you did it because you are a good person, Merlin. Everything you did, you did for a reason. And everything you did because of _her_ —that wasn’t you. What’s important is what you do _now._ So what do you want to do?” 


	36. An Excess of Sunlight

Arthur is pretending to work. The windows are open, letting in a cool spring breeze. It ruffles the papers on his desk, and he must put down his quill to collect them. Ink dribbles as he does so, and he curses before rubbing at the desktop with his handkerchief. 

There is the whisper of molecules sliding against each other, and Merlin appears in the center of Arthur’s room. He looks much better than before, which is to say, he looks alive. All his body parts are connected. He is not a smear smashed across the the forest floor. 

Arthur struggles to swallow. His quill quivers in his hand, and he puts it down. “Merlin,” he says. 

Merlin looks dazed. He walks slowly around the room, remembering it. When he gets to Arthur’s bed, he picks up Arthur’s pillow and presses it to his nose. The familiar scent of Arthur’s hair hits Merlin like a punch to the gut. A few weeks ago, Merlin would have gagged at this smell. He would have cringed away from any reminder of Arthur. 

But this is now. 

Merlin puts the pillow back down and goes to the window. Soon, the sun will begin its descent into the forest. He watches the trees catch the sunlight. 

“Merlin,” Arthur says again. He’s standing now, his fingertips grazing the tabletop. “Can you hear me?”

Merlin nods without looking away from the sky. His eyes burn with an excess of sunlight. 

Arthur coughs uncomfortably. “I assume you’re feeling better.”

“I didn’t mean to fall,” says Merlin. “I forgot about gravity.” 

“Of course you did,” says Arthur. It comes out fondly, as if he and Merlin are friends. Are they? Arthur doesn’t know. He can’t tell. “You worried me, back there.”

“I’m sorry,” Merlin says. “I won’t do it again.” 

“Good,” Arthur says awkwardly. “That’s good to hear.”

Suddenly tired, Merlin sinks to a seated position on the floor, his back against the wall. He lets his legs flop in front of him like the limbs of a doll. Tentatively, Arthur joins Merlin on the ground. He is so close that Merlin can make out the individual pores of his face.

“Who are you?” Arthur says suddenly. His face turns red, and he looks at his hands. “I didn’t mean it like that.” 

“You want to know how much of My—her is left,” says Merlin. It hurts to say her name “To tell the truth, I don’t know where she stops and I start.” He grins humorlessly. 

“Are you still afraid of me?” 

Merlin lets himself feel his own power. He is so incredibly strong that he thinks he should never be afraid of anyone. But Merlin is made of more than magic. His human parts—the shells of his ears, the roof of his mouth, his heart—can hurt in infinite ways. 

Does Merlin fear Arthur? Does he think Arthur will hurt him? Arthur loves him, but so did Myfanwy. 

Merlin looks at Arthur’s proffered hand for a long while. He breathes very slowly, his shoulders barely moving. There is so much he wants to say, but his emotions refuse to reduce themselves to words.

“I’ve been thinking,” Arthur says. His voice cracks, and he licks his lips. “I’ve been thinking about the day that I killed you. Gutted you. I’m sorry, Merlin. I’m so sorry.”

“No,” Merlin says sharply. “It’s not your fault. Myfanwy made you do it.”

“But I—”

“If you feel guilty for that, can you imagine the weight I have to bear?” Merlin leans forward. His eyes are wet, his voice insistent. “Can you image the multitude of deaths I have afflicted because she made me _want_ to?” 

“Yes!” says Arthur. “Of course I can imagine! Do you know how many sorcerers I’ve put to death, Merlin? And I wasn’t under anyone’s spell. I was free.” He spits out the last word like a bullet. 

“I should have done better with you,” says Merlin. Arthur looks up in surprise.

“What?”

“I should have done better,” says Merlin. “I should have untaught your hate. But I was too busy…I don’t even know what I was to busy doing. Saving you, I suppose.” 

“Maybe you should have picked a better prince to save,” says Arthur. 

“I didn’t get a choice!” cries Merlin. He gives a few ragged breaths as he tries to calm himself. “I didn’t get a choice. I was born to serve you, Arthur. I was born for you.” He’s crying openly, his tears splashing down his cheeks and dampening his tunic. Crying is infections; Arthur’s own eyes tingle. He gives up on keeping his hand on the floor and twists his hands together. They stare into each other’s eyes.

“Listen, then,” Arthur says fiercely. “I’m setting you free. All right? I’m setting you free. You don’t have to serve me anymore. You can be yourself now.”

Merlin howls. He cries so hard that strings of saliva drip from his mouth. Mucus and tears get on his hands, his clothes. Merlin’s entire body shakes with grief.

_I belong to myself and no one else. I belong to myself and no one else._

Inside his mind, walls are crashing down.

_I belong to myself and no one else. I belong to myself and no one else._

He does not belong to Arthur, he does not belong to Myfanwy, he does not belong to Killgharrah or destiny. He does not belong to magic, he does not belong to humanity. There is no one in Merlin’s head but Merlin. His body moves because he tells it to, his cries unspool like thread because he lets them. 

Merlin rises so quickly that his vision blacks out, and he has to lean against the wall. His ears ring. His head spins. He falls against Arthur and stumbles back. He can’t be touched. He must be touched. He reaches out like a drowning man, and Arthur takes his hand. Both their arms are fully extended; they stand six feet apart. There is a world between them, but their hands still touch.

Their hands still touch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All that's left is the epilogue :)


	37. Epilogue

Here we are at the end of the tale. The battles have been won, the friend found, the sick healed, the evil killed. One day, Camelot will prosper. Not quite yet, but soon. At the moment, Camelot is a city of orphans. Children of all shapes and sizes are everywhere: playing in the square, watching the knights practice, hiding behind tapestries in the castle in an enormous game of hide-and-seek. 

“Are you getting anywhere?” the queen asks her court sorcerer. They have spent the day in the throne room, listening to grievance after grievance by the hungry men and women of Camelot. Though exhausted, Morgana is sitting at the table in their bedchamber, poring over a stack of magic books she’d stolen from the castle library. At Gwen’s question, she sighs and pushes away the book she’s currently perusing.

“I thought a replication spell, maybe,” says Morgana. “But so many of them are temporary. Food doesn’t do anyone any good if it disappears from their belly.” A yawn catches her by surprise, opening her mouth enough to make her jaw crack.

Gwen puts a hand on Morgana’s shoulder. “You can work on this more tomorrow,” she says softly. 

“But I have a responsibility—” 

“As your queen, I order you to come to bed,” says Gwen.

Morgana raises a brow. “Do you think I take orders?” 

Gwen leans down and kisses the corner of Morgana’s mouth. “Please come to bed?”

“If I must,” says Morgana, pretending to pout.

Let’s let them be.

Direct your gaze out the window, at the Forest Sauvage. Look down into the trees. Deep down below us, on the forest floor, Merlin is having a nightmare.

Arthur is keeping watch when Merlin cries out. After a month traveling with Merlin, undoing as much of Myfanwy’s malfeasance as possible—apparently, porcelain bodies can be softened back into flesh, blasted pits in the earth restored—Arthur is used to these sounds.

It still wrenches at him, though, the horrible noise of Merlin’s terror. Cautiously, Arthur crawls around the fire to his love. 

“You’re all right, Merlin,” he whispers. “It’s just a dream.” 

Merlin is still asleep, his face pinched and troubled. Tears glisten on his lashes. Arthur wonders what horror is gripping Merlin’s mind. God knows there are plenty of scenes from the past five years that Merlin’s unconscious could pick. 

“Shhh.” Arthur runs his fingers through Merlin unruly hair. It whispers against Arthur’s fingers, soft as feathers. “Shhh, you’re all right. You’re all right.” Cautiously, a little afraid of being thrown into a tree, Arthur soothes Merlin back to sleep. 

Arthur can’t know it yet, but tomorrow they will walk through the forest clearing where Arthur once split Merlin from sternum to pelvis. They will stand beneath the emerald-leaved trees and look up at the sun showering light upon them. And in this moment, for the first time in six years, Merlin will kiss Arthur. 

Tonight, the sun still unrisen and the moon high in the sky, Arthur leans back against a tree and watches for dangers in the dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
